Tag Archives: military

Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center: British Hawker Hurricane, with P-38 Lightning and B-29 Enola Gay behind it

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Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Hawker Hurricane Mk. IIC:

Hawker Chief Designer Sydney Camm’s Hurricane ranks with the most important aircraft designs in military aviation history. Designed in the late 1930s, when monoplanes were considered unstable and too radical to be successful, the Hurricane was the first British monoplane fighter and the first British fighter to exceed 483 kilometers (300 miles) per hour in level flight. Hurricane pilots fought the Luftwaffe and helped win the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940.

This Mark IIC was built at the Langley factory, near what is now Heathrow Airport, early in 1944. It served as a training aircraft during the World War II in the Royal Air Force’s 41 OTU.

Donated by the Royal Air Force Museum

Manufacturer:
Hawker Aircraft Ltd.

Date:
1944

Country of Origin:
United Kingdom

Dimensions:
Wingspan: 12.2 m (40 ft)
Length: 9.8 m (32 ft 3 in)
Height: 4 m (13 ft)
Weight, empty: 2,624 kg (5,785 lb)
Weight, gross: 3,951 kg (8,710 lb)
Top speed:538 km/h (334 mph)
Engine:Rolls-Royce Merlin XX, liquid-cooled in-line V, 1,300 hp
Armament:four 20 mm Hispano cannons
Ordnance:two 250-lb or two 500-lb bombs or eight 3-in rockets

Materials:
Fuselage: Steel tube with aircraft spruce forms and fabric, aluminum cowling
Wings: Stressed Skin Aluminum
Horizontal Stablizer: Stress Skin aluminum
Rudder: fabric covered aluminum
Control Surfaces: fabric covered aluminum

Physical Description:
Hawker Hurricane Mk. IIC single seat, low wing monoplane ground attack fighter; enclosed cockpit; steel tube fuselage with aircraft spruce forms and fabric, aluminum cowling, stressed skin aluminum wings and horizontal stablizer, fabric covered aluminum rudder and control surfaces; grey green camoflage top surface paint scheme with dove grey underside; red and blue national roundel on upper wing surface and red, white, and blue roundel lower wing surface; red, white, blue, and yellow roundel fuselage sides; red, white and blue tail flash; Rolls-Royce Merlin XX, liquid cooled V-12, 1,280 horsepower engine; Armament, 4: 20mm Hispano cannons.

• • • • •

Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Boeing B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay":

Boeing’s B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.

On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions.

Transferred from the United States Air Force.

Manufacturer:
Boeing Aircraft Co.
Martin Co., Omaha, Nebr.

Date:
1945

Country of Origin:
United States of America

Dimensions:
Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)

Materials:
Polished overall aluminum finish

Physical Description:
Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.

• • • • •

Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Lockheed P-38J-10-LO Lightning:

In the P-38 Lockheed engineer Clarence "Kelly" Johnson and his team of designers created one of the most successful twin-engine fighters ever flown by any nation. From 1942 to 1945, U. S. Army Air Forces pilots flew P-38s over Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Pacific, and from the frozen Aleutian Islands to the sun-baked deserts of North Africa. Lightning pilots in the Pacific theater downed more Japanese aircraft than pilots flying any other Allied warplane.

Maj. Richard I. Bong, America’s leading fighter ace, flew this P-38J-10-LO on April 16, 1945, at Wright Field, Ohio, to evaluate an experimental method of interconnecting the movement of the throttle and propeller control levers. However, his right engine exploded in flight before he could conduct the experiment.

Transferred from the United States Air Force.

Manufacturer:
Lockheed Aircraft Company

Date:
1943

Country of Origin:
United States of America

Dimensions:
Overall: 390 x 1170cm, 6345kg, 1580cm (12ft 9 9/16in. x 38ft 4 5/8in., 13988.2lb., 51ft 10 1/16in.)

Materials:
All-metal

Physical Description:
Twin-tail boom and twin-engine fighter; tricycle landing gear.

By: Chris Devers

Explorer 1 a – Smithsonian Air and Space Museum – 2012-05-15

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A model of Explorer 1, the first artificial satellite launched by the United States, on display in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

In 1954, U.S. scientists and military officials decided to try to launch an artificial satellite during the International Geophysical Year (which ran from July 1957 to June 1958). On July 29, 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower made the decision public. But the Americans were way behind in technology: On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1 into orbit. This was followed by Sputnik 2 just months later.

Two agencies competed to put a satellite into orbit. The Army and Navy collaborated on Project Orbiter, which proposed using an existing Redstone ballistic missile for the rocket. But the Navy had separately developed the Vanguard rocket, and the Eisenhower administration chose to go this route. But when Sputnik launched, the U.S. realized it had to go back to Orbiter — which was more likely to launch sooner than Vanguard.

In just 84 days, a Jupiter-C rocket was modified to carry a fourth stage (necessary for gaining orbit). This rocket was renamed Juno-1. The Navy tried to launch a satellite aboard a Vanguard on December 6, 1957, but the rocket exploded.

Explorer 1 was designed and built by the California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Unlike Sputnik — which broke free of its rocket — Explorer was designed to stay attached to the fourth-stage booster that got it into space. Therefore, Explorer was designed to be a long cylinder (like its booster). It spun around its long axis at 750 revolutions per minute (to keep it from tumbling in space).

A 60 milliwatt radio transmitted via a dipole antenna inside the casing, and a 10 milliwatt radio transmitted via four whip antennas which jutted from the body. Power was provided by mercury chemical batteries.

To reduce weight, the newly-developed transistor was used. This was risky, but it proved to be the right decision. The scientific instruments were built under the supervision of Dr. James Van Allen of the University of Iowa. There was a cosmic ray detection tube, five temperature sensors (four external), an acoustic detector to detect micrometeorite impacts against the hull, and a wire grid detector to detect micrometeorite impacts.

Explorer I was painted in alternate strips of white and green. This not only helped radiate heat away from the satellite, but allowed visual sightings of the craft to determine how fast it was spinning, its angle, and its altitude.

Explorer I was launched on January 31, 1958. It orbited at 222 miles, and went around the earh every 114.8 minutes.

Explorer I reentered the atmosphere on March 31, 1970.

The cosmic ray device didn’t function as anticipated. Scientists later learned that it had become saturated with radiation from a vast web of high-energy radioactive particles caught in the Earth’s magnetic field. This web is known today as the Van Allen radiation belt.

Both micrometeorite devices worked fine.

By: dctim1

USS Intrepid, Sea, Air & Space Museum, New York City

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The USS carrier Intrepid at The Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, Pier 86, 12th Ave. & 46th Street, New York City.

This Essex Class aircraft carrier was one of America’s most effective military vessels. Along with her 23 sister ships, the USS Intrepid formed the backbone of the United States Navy.

Throughout the Pacific Campaign of World War II, the USS Intrepid suffered seven bomb attacks, five kamikaze strikes and one torpedo hit; yet the ship continually returned to action after repairs, earning her the reputation among the enemy as the "The Ghost Ship."

After World War II, the Intrepid underwent a modernization, enabling her new, angled flight deck to accommodate jet aircraft. During the 1960′s, the Intrepid served as a primary recovery vessel for NASA, picking up both the Mercury and Gemini capsules.

After three tours of duty in Vietnam and tracking Soviet submarines during the Cold War as an ASW (antisubmarine warfare) ship, the Intrepid was officially retired in 1974.

On the flight deck America’s modern military cutting edge is represented by a Navy F-14 Tomcat, an Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon, a Marine Corps AV-8A Harrier and an A-12 Blackbird spy plane (shown here)

By: Jim Linwood