The Aviation Historian Magazine Issue 42 Vorige editie

Conceived as a “fire-and-forget” missile, the Firestreak entered service in the late 1950s and paved the way for subsequent British air-launched guided weapons. In the 42nd quarterly edition of The Aviation Historian we examine its development, along with the nuts and bolts of how it worked — with the help of specially-created information graphics by Ian Bott. Also in this issue, we revisit the problematic Westland Whirlwind twin-engined fighter of WW2; trace how a pre-WW1 battleship laid down for the Chilean Navy eventually became the world’s biggest and most advanced aircraft carrier, serving the Royal Navy from 1924 to 1942; and complete our story of how unmanned B-17 Flying Fortress drones played a part in post-war American atomic tests. Plus: the UK government’s involvement in a plan to sell an advanced jet fighter design to Iraq, just ten years before RAF Tornadoes took part in Operation Desert Storm in 1991; the rise and fall of French independent airline UTA; the RAF’s use of chemical weapons; and why “base-burning” was a red-hot aerodynamic topic for combat jet designers in the 1970s. All this, and much more, is illustrated with high-quality archive photographs and bespoke artwork.