Fighter Planes (Beginners Plus)

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We learn that three years earlier, the young German immigrant Edgar Schmued was working at the fledgling North American Aviation Company when his boss asked him to meet Britain’s urgent need for a new fighter by designing “the fastest airplane you can”, around a 5ft 10 inch, 140lb man.

But Beaverbrook failed to put his demand in writing and so, without formal instruction from his boss, Freeman allowed de caption id="attachment_7490" align="alignnone" width="163" caption="Evocative passages in First Light could have been written yesterday."] [/caption] Only published in 2002 this gripping account from an RAF Spitfire pilot of fighting in the Battle of Britain reads as fresh as if was written yesterday. Wellum, who joined 92 Squadron in 1940, was one of the youngest pilots in the Battle and eloquently describes how, to him, one year he was at school, the next he was engaged in a desperate fight with the Luftwaffe above Kent. West with the Night – Beryl Markham

Had the Second World War in the air been decided on aesthetics alone, the RAF would have beaten the Luftwaffe hands-down. The Spitfire fighter had a deadly elegance that outshone its homelier rival, the Messerschmitt 109. In monumental majesty, the Lancaster dwarfed anything in the enemy’s bomber fleet. And as for the all-rounders in between, there was nothing that the Germans produced that could hold a candle to the marvellous Mosquito. By October, the newly dubbed Mustang Mk10 was ready for takeoff. It reached an astonishing 427mph at 21,000ft. Even more astonishing, as it flew higher it no longer lost speed. It gained it. The Mosquito brought to bombing some much-needed accuracy, enabling surgical strikes on key targets that were beyond less gifted aircraft. Its numerous battle honours included some of the RAF’s most celebrated feats, including the daylight raid on Berlin in January 1943, timed to arrive just as Herman Göring was about to make a radio speech to mark the 10th anniversary of the Nazi takeover. The Reichsmarschall was cut off by the sound of 500lb pound bombs exploding across the capital. Contents: Introduction - Chronology - Design and development - Strategic situation - Technical specifications - The combatants - Combat - Statistics and analysis - Aftermath - Bibliography - Glossary. Author:

That is, until the arrival of the Albatros D II, a sleek inline-engined machine built for speed and with twin-gun firepower. Thus, the later part of 1916 saw an epic struggle in the skies above the Somme pitting the manoeuvrable yet under-gunned DH 2s against the less nimble yet better armed and faster Albatros D IIs. caption id="attachment_7491" align="alignnone" width="166" caption="West with the Night reminds us that flying is not just a man's world."] [/caption] ‘Poetry in flight’ best describes this 1942 memoir from aviatrix Beryl Markham of bush flying in Africa and long-distance flight, which includes her solo flight across the Atlantic. Lyrical and expressive her descriptions of the adventure of flying continue to inspire others, including Boeing test pilot Captain Suzanna Darcy-Hennemann, who said Markham's book was 'closest to her heart' in a RAeS lecture. Biggles Pioneer Air Fighter W.E. Johns Ein Jahrhundert Luft- und Raumfahrt in Bremen: Von den frühesten Flugversuchen zum Airbus und zur Ariane After first entering RAF service with a photo reconnaissance unit, the first Mosquito bomber squadron formed a few months later. The Albatros was the scourge of the RFC on the Western Front in 1916-17, with pilots of the calibre of von Richthofen, Boelke and Schleich cutting swathes through their opponents. Well over 4000 Albatros scouts were built between 1916 and 1918, and they were also extensively used by the Austro-Hungarians against Russian, Italian and British aircraft until war's end.The Nobel-prize winning nuclear physicist was one of a number of high-value passengers including spies, downed aircrew and even artists on cultural visits who were carried to and from the Swedish capital inside the felt-lined fuselage of the war’s most unlikely airliner. To try to ensure it didn’t, an expedition was sent out to explore the jungles of Central America in search of alternative sources of the lightweight wood.