Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Aeroplane Icons - Hurricane

I often enjoy discussing various subjects, especially aviation ones, where I like to take the opposite viewpoint regardless of whether I agree with it or not in order to prompt discussion. When the subject of Spitfire or Hurricane comes up I will always plump for the Hurricane as the better aircraft... though not to play devil's advocate, but because it was! It may have not been the prettiest or the best performing but it will always been seen as the aircraft we needed at the time and, thankfully, in high numbers. Its design incorporated older, tried and tested technologies but also took fighter design a little further forward. When George Bulman first took the prototype into the air at Brooklands on the 6th November 1935, the new Hurricane was presented to the world as a modern fighting monoplane. Fitted with eight guns, a retractable undercarriage and the ability to breach 300mph with ease, many journalists of the day commented that the peak of fighter performance had finally been reached.

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