A Short History: The Hawker Tempest - WWII's Pivotal Fighter
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- Опубликовано: 12 сен 2024
- Explore the history of the Hawker Tempest, a pivotal aircraft of WWII. Dive into its design evolution, variants, and significant roles in key operations like Market Garden, the Battle of the Bulge, and Operation Crossbow. Learn about its challenges against the V-1 flying bombs and its place in aviation museums today.
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just got the airfix of this plane and now after watching this, it is one of my most faveroute planes.
French Tempest V ace pilot Pierre Closterman describes the friendly wartime rivalry beetween RAF Tempest and Spitfire pilots. A common joke on jointly used RAF airfields was that the landing speed of the Tempest was higher that the cruising speed of the Spitfire...
On one occasion apparently a Spitfire spotted a German Arado 234 reconnaissance jet aircraft flying at treetop height and managed to shoot it down diving flat-out from above, popping rivets in the process. Later in the mess Spit pilots being triumphant, saying "that's something you've never managed to do in your "lead sleds" (literally "lead dogs, "chiens de plomb" in French), meaning the rather heavy Tempests.
Though the Tempests did shoot down a number of Messerschmitt Me262 jet fighters on "rat-catching" missions, mainly by ambushing them in their landing phase when they were the most vulnerable. Late in the war the Germans mounted standing patrols over the Mer262's airfields consisting of Focke-Wulf FW190 D models with red and black stripes under the wings.
The Tempest on the deck was was 30mph faster than the Spitfire
I read Clostermans book a few months ago, it reads like a thriller, one of the best books I've read on WW2 aerial combat. It was a real eye opener on the number of casualties the RAF were still getting right the way through to May 1945, whereas most books give the impression that by early 1945 the luftwaffe were finished. Also the dangers of ground straffes especially on German airfields, it must have felt like they were being sent on kamikaze missions.
I've read Clostermans book 3 or 4 times now and I never get tired of it!
I liked the allied aircraft over the German Me 262s.
Incredible advancements in aircrafts from 1940-'45
Yes, just look at what Germany developed towards the end of the war.
The Mark 2 did not operate during the war, iirc. It was only the Mark V model that was used for V-1 hunting ( along with other operational aircraft like the Spitfire )
very good.
Not really a “pivotal” fighter as it really wasn’t an air superiority fighter, it was fast and it could hit like a train but not a dog fighter by any stretch, luckily it didn’t need to be as there was already plenty of air superiority aircraft so its ground attack capability became very relevant.