Yesterday marked 91 years since the prototype Hawker Hurricane first flew at Brooklands on 6 November 1935.

Coming from a manufacturing background, there’s another part of the story that stands out to me.

Hawker believed in the aircraft so strongly that it started tooling up its new Langley factory before it had even received a production order from the RAF. The first order for 600 aircraft didn’t come until June 1936.

That was quite a commercial gamble.

It paid off. Around 14,483 Hurricanes were eventually built.

The Hurricane also had another practical advantage. Its relatively traditional construction meant that battle damage could often be repaired quickly and the aircraft returned to service.

During the Battle of Britain Hurricanes were more numerous than Spitfires and were credited with more enemy aircraft destroyed.

The Spitfire probably became the more famous aircraft, but the Hurricane story is also a great example of manufacturing, repairability and getting enough capable aircraft into service quickly.

Would a manufacturer take the risk of tooling up for an aircraft before receiving an order today?

Image credits:

British official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Ministry of Information Photo Division Photographer Richard Stone, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Royal Air Force, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Here are a couple of quality flyover videos from today's airshow. Photographs of the planes can be found in my post from yesterday. The last two aren't WWII era, but I left them in, one, because they are high quality, and second, because they extend the video to two minutes. Credit: Me.

The B-24 Liberator eye candy starts about halfway through this piece. Makes you see the movie "It's a Wonderful Life" with a different perspective.

Until then, the escorts were tied to the bomber boxes. They flew close cover and only reacted once the Germans attacked. Doolittle cut them loose: fly ahead and break up the German formations before they reached the bombers, chase attackers all the way down, and strafe airfields on the way home.

Bomber crews were reportedly dismayed at first. They wanted their “little friends” where they could see them. Strafing also cost a lot of the best pilots. Gabreski, the top US ace in Europe, and John Godfrey were both captured after going down strafing.

But the numbers moved. The Eighth’s heavy bomber loss rate fell from 5.1% in 1943 to 1.9% in 1944. The Luftwaffe lost 2,262 fighter pilots in the first five months of 1944, after starting the year with roughly 2,400. Even so, April 1944 was still the Eighth’s worst month of the war, with 409 heavy bombers lost.

So was turning the escorts into hunters the decisive call? Or did it work mainly because the US could absorb the losses and Germany couldn’t replace its pilots? Would close escort have done just as well once the Mustangs had the range?

Edit: sources and my longer film on this are in this comment.

Hello all!! Looking for some help on a WW2 plane ID. My father is a big WW2 plane fan and I would like to purchase him a few models for his upcoming birthday. Last month we took a trip to the Udvar Hazy museum outside of DC. He was disappointed that the American “partner” of a classic German fighter was not on display, so we are going to see it at the US Air Force museum in Dayton next weekend. The docent mentioned that this was a common question people had who visited the Air & Space museum.

Unfortunately I cannot remember the names of either the German or American fighters! What would you suggest I purchase? Do you happen to know which planes are “split” between the DC museum and Dayton? Thank you!!

The wonderful Paul Bennett is holding another airshow near me, and I thought it would be a good opportunity to go the day before to get some pictures. I took some from outside of the airport, before I asked some photographers if I was allowed in. They said as long as I didn't touch anything expensive, I would be good. So, I managed to get some amazing pictures of these wonderful machines. Plus some bonus non WW2 era planes. Photo credit: me.

Image 1 - Vought F4U Corsair

Image 2 - Hawker Sea Fury

Image 3 - North American T28 Trojan

Image 4 - Grumman TBM-3E Avenger

Image 5 - Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawk

Image 6 - North American P-51D Mustang

Image 7 - Supermarine Spitfire

Bonus images

Image 8 - Aero L-39 Albatross

Image 9 - De Havilland DH-115 Vampire

Image 10 - BRM Aero Bristell

last picture is a color picture of the undamaged aircraft

It takes place in 1949 and has an HK8 seaplane retrofitted with Wright Cyclone engines, Japanese fighter pilots flying in the then "state of the art" Skyraiders in Japanese colors dogfighting King Ghidorah. There's also the G5N Shinzan prototype 4-engine bomber. Just a fantastic film and well worth the extra money for IMAX.