The Handley Page Halifax was the most advanced strategic bomber in the RAF's inventory from its service introduction in 1941 until overshadowed by the Avro Lancaster in 1942. The Halifax was designed by Handley Page, Ltd., in response to a 1936 Royal Air Force (RAF) requirement for a bomber powered by two 24-cylinder Rolls-Royce Vulture engines. It was introduced in Update 1.59 "Flaming Arrows". The Halifax was produced in large numbers during the war: of the 10,018 heavy bombers produced in Britain between 1940 and 1944, 4,046 were various models of the Halifax in excess of 40%. The Halifax featured all-metal construction with a smooth, stressed skin covering the majority of the exterior surfaces; the flight control surfaces were an exception, being fabric-covered instead. After the demise of the founder of LAMS the company ceased business. Its operational debut occurred on the night of 1011 March 1941, when six Halifax bombers flew a bombing raid against Le Havre, targeting the area around the docks and any shipping that might be present. The company went into liquidation after the one flight. A project is currently underway with the stated aim of finding, recovering and restoring Halifax LW170. This name followed the practice of naming heavy bombers after major towns in this case, Halifax in the West Riding of Yorkshire. 417, 419, 423, 603. After World War II LAMS obtained 16 ex RAF Halifaxes for the carriage of freight. The Halifax B Mk IIIa is a rank II British bomber with a battle rating of 4.0 (AB/RB) and 4.3 (SB). This site tracks the history of all Handley Page Halifaxs that survived military service. This area led to the two-gun dorsal turret. 387388. Introduction of 1,390hp (1,040kW) Merlin XX engines and a twin .303in (7.7mm) dorsal turret instead of waist guns resulted in the B Mk II Series I Halifax. Quick Facts First flight 25th October 1939 Subtle modifications distinguished the Mk I aircraft. Most of these engines were under development. [25] [10] Different models of the Halifax used different numbers and combinations of turrets, effectively trading speed for firepower and vice versa. Handley Page Halifax Mark II Series 1s of No. It was developed by Handley Page to the same specification as the contemporary twin-engine Avro Manchester. The most numerous Halifax variant was the B Mk III of which 2,091 were built. [10], The bomb aimer's position was in the extreme nose with the navigator's table located behind it, both roles fulfilled by the same crew member. A transport/cargo version of the Halifax was also produced, known as the Handley Page Halton. The sizeable production run envisioned required the involvement of several external parties in addition to Handley Page. The Halifax was also operated by the Royal Canadian Air Force, Royal Australian Air Force, Free French Air Force and Polish forces. There was and still is no better symbol to Canada, and the world, of a mighty Sword of Freedom wielded by young warriors who defeated tyranny and it is the HANDLEY PAGE HALIFAX. The English Electric company thus mass-produced thousands of piston-engined bombers, such as the Handley Page Hampden and Handley Page Halifax, and the firm became a well . The Halifax saw Service in Europe and the Middle East with a variety of variants for use with Coastal Command, in Anti Submarine Warfare, Special Duties, Glider-Tugs, & Troop Transportation roles. 158 Squadron RAF on the port side and "N - Novembre" of 347 "Guyenne" Squadron, Free French Air Force, on the starboard side (RAF Elvington being the home of the only two French heavy bomber squadrons in Bomber Command). VII NP707, which completed 67 operations with No. Other candidates for the specification included the Avro 679, and designs from Fairey, Boulton Paul and Shorts; all were designed around a two-engine installation, using the Rolls-Royce Vulture, Napier Sabre, Fairey P.24 or Bristol Hercules. 8 Group. By the time of the Munich crisis, orders were increased and work was proceeding to get the bombers on order from the various manufacturers to Bomber Command as quickly as possible. [33] The Halifax also found itself being increasingly tasked with transport duties around this time; in one instance, around half a million gallons of petrol was delivered to Brussels in support of the advancing Second Army, then engaged in heavy fighting at Arnhem. Second World War (1939-1945) [10] Pathfinder crews flying the Halifax would mark routes and identify and mark targets for the Main Force. A project is currently underway with the stated aim of finding, recovering and restoring Halifax LW170. [16] This was answered by the Halifax Mk III, which was powered by Bristol Hercules radial engines in place of the Merlins. A two-gun BP Type C turret mounted dorsally replaced the beam guns. In mid-1937, it was decided to order both the Avro 679 and HP56 designs "off the drawing board" in order to speed up delivery timetables. The Pakistan Air Force, which had inherited a number of Halifax bombers from the RAF, also continued to operate them and became the last military user of the type, retiring the last aircraft in 1961. The Halifax was a British Royal Air Force (RAF) four-engined heavy bomber powered by the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine. The Halifax Mk.I was quickly followed by 25 of the Mk I Series II; these featured an increased gross weight from 58,000lb (26t) to 60,000lb (27t) but with maximum landing weight unchanged at 50,000lb (23t). 25.00 1 bid 4d 15h + 4.90 postage. 1586 (Polish Special Duties) Flight before reforming as 301 Squadron Special Duties, Geoffrey Wikner (B3 converted with a 15-passenger interior), Westminster Airways (converted as a bulk fuel carrier for Berlin Airlift). A dedicated civil transport variant, the Handley Page Halton, was also developed and entered airline service; 41 civil Halifax freighters were used during the Berlin Airlift. [4] In response, Handley Page produced the twin-engine HP56 design to meet Specification P.13/36. Halifax, also called Handley Page Halifax, British heavy bomber used during World War II. Civil Registration: None : Model(s): Halifax Mk. Following the end of the Second World War, the RAF quickly retired the Halifax, after the type was succeeded as a strategic bomber by the Avro Lincoln, an advanced derivative of the Lancaster. Accordingly, in 1936, the RAF decided to investigate the feasibility of a four-engined bomber. Meanwhile, both the United States and the Soviet Union were developing bombers powered by arrangements of four smaller engines with favorable results, including excellent range and fair lifting capacity. [35] During the final months of the war the improved Halifax Mk VI and Mk VII were introduced. [citation needed], Other candidates were submitted for the same specification, including the Avro 679, and designs from Fairey, Boulton Paul and Shorts; all submissions were designed around two-engine configurations, using the Rolls-Royce Vulture, Napier Sabre, Fairey P.24 or Bristol Hercules engines. [35] While some of these Mk VI and Mk VII machines were deployed to the theatre, they played little meaningful role as the war ended before larger numbers could be brought to bear against Japanese forces. A Mk II (W1048) has been displayed, conserved but unrestored, at the RAF Museum at Hendon in Greater London as it was recovered from a lake in Norway. Handley Page Halifax B.III Number: A06008A Scale: 1:72 Type: Full kit Released: 2014 New decals Barcode: 5014429000829 (EAN) Topic: Handley Page Halifax Propeller (Aircraft) Markings Handley Page Halifax Handley Page Halifax B Mk.III Royal Australian Air Force (1921-now) 462 Sqn. The Halifax was produced for a number of tasks. 644 Squadron RAF, then based at RAF Tarrant Rushton, is a transport/special duties version, and was retrieved from the bottom of Lake Mjsa in Norway in 1995 after being shot down in April 1945. This aircraft was re-constructed from a fuselage section of Halifax B.Mk.II HR792 and parts from other aircraft including the wings from an RAF Hastings. It was mainly used as a night bomber. On later-built aircraft, the two-gun dorsal turret was replaced by a four-gun Boulton Paul turret. The Halifax was also flown in large numbers by other Allied and Commonwealth nations, such as the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF), Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), Free French Air Force and Polish forces. Data from Halifax, Second to None,[56] The Handley Page Halifax B.III, VI, VII[12]. Around 7,378 were realized Lancaster (excluding prototypes), 430 of them in Canada and they were lost in action 3,932.The Handley Page Halifax was . from Czech Republic Upon the end of the conflict, Bomber Command quickly disbanded the majority of its Halifax-equipped squadrons; the aircraft themselves were transferred to Transport Command. [10], In the second half of 1942, No. The second aircraft the organization is seeking to recover is LW170 off the coast of Scotland. But to celebrate them is to be silent about the people who sit and sleep underneath them, the homeless poor who are hauled away by the city like trash, except it has no place to dump them. [citation needed], During July 1937, Handley Page was instructed to redesign the HP56 to use a four-engine arrangement, instead of the original twin-engine configuration; by this point, the Vulture had already been suffering from reliability and performance problems. Like the Avro Lancaster, the original plan was for a twin-engine aircraft. It was progressively outnumbered in frontline service over occupied Europe as more Lancasters became available from 1943 onwards, with many squadrons converting to the Lancaster. Owing to a shortage of Messier-built landing gear and hydraulics, Dowty landing gear was used. English: The Handley Page Halifax was a British heavy bomber aircraft of World War II. It made a round-the-world flight commencing on 23 April 1947 from Elstree. On 25 October 1939, the maiden flight of the first prototype Halifax, serial number L7244, was performed by chief test pilot Jim Cordes with E A 'Ginger' Wright as flight test observer; during this flight, the undercarriage remained locked down as an extra safety precaution. [33] On 27 August, a force of 216 Halifax bombers, alongside smaller numbers of de Havilland Mosquitos and Lancasters and a sizable escort of Supermarine Spitfires, conducted the first major daylight operation by Bomber Command against a target inside Germany that year, attacking the oil refinery at Homberg on the Ruhr. A third Halifax is a B.Mk.II, serial W1048, 'S' for Sugar of no. This necessitated the removal of all armament and making provision for freight, nine stretchers, or eight passengers. This was 24in 26.5in (61cm 67cm), the same size as the Stirling, and slightly larger than the 22in 26.5in (56cm 67cm) for the Lancaster. Arthur Harris, the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief of Bomber Command, described the Halifax as inferior to the rival Lancaster (in part due to its smaller payload) though this opinion was not shared by many of the crews that flew it, particularly for the MkIII variant. 4 Group had been entirely equipped with the Halifax, and would continue to operate the aircraft until the end of the war. Accordingly, during April 1937, the Air Ministry ordered two prototypes of each design. A further compartment aft of the flight engineer contained two bunks originally intended for resting crew members, but almost always used for treating and berthing injured crew. In a reply on 2 June 1942, to a telegram sent by Frederick Handley Page congratulating him on the success of the first 1000 bomber Cologne raid, he stated: "My Dear Handley Page. Harris continued to have a poor opinion of the Halifax, despite the fact that later Hercules-engined machines had lower loss rates and higher crew survival rates after abandoning the aircraft than Lancasters, and came very close to the Lancaster's speed and altitude performance. Handley Page Halifax The Halifax shared with the Lancaster the major burden of Bomber Command's night bombing campaign over Europe. The Halifax was heavily used to deploy mines in the vicinity of enemy-held ports. On the night of the 27/28 April 1942, this aircraft was taking part in a raid on the Tirpitz - its first operational flight. Handley Page Halifax VH-BDT Waltzing Matilda at Cloncurry, QLD in 1947 (via Ben Dannecker), Four 1,205 kw (1,615 hp) Bristol Hercules VI fourteen-cylinder two-row sleeve-valve radial engines, One 7.7 mm (0.303 in) Vickers K machine gun on flexible mount in nose; four 7.7 mm (0.303 in) Browning machine guns in Boulton & Paul A Mk III dorsal turret; four 7.7 mm (0.303 in) Browning machine guns in Boulton & Paul E turret in tail; max bomb load 5,897 kg (13,000 lb). Here's a few 'what you get in the box' shots. RM KJCPC0 - Halifax Bomber 4 ExCC The Halifax shared with the Lancaster the major burden of Bomber Command's night bombing campaign over Europe. [35] It served increasingly in other support capacities as the war progressed, being used as a glider tug, an electronic warfare aircraft for No. Handley Page built the assemblies and components at Cricklewood and the aircraft were assembled and flown from Radlett Aerodrome; the first production aircraft flew from Radlett on 11 October 1940. The Handley Page Halifax was a four-engined heavy bomber operated by the British Royal Air Force during World War II. Nine aircraft were lost during the airlift. [s ee more ] [12][10] At the peak, 41 separate factories and dispersed units were involved in production, along with 600 subcontractors and 51,000 employees, with one Halifax completed every hour. The Halifax shared with the Lancaster the major burden of Bomber Command's night bombing campaign against Nazi Germany but unlike the Lancaster, which only served as a bomber during the war, the Halifax was used extensively on other duties including glider-tug, agent dropping transport and general reconnaissance . At the point of its maximum production, its operations enveloped 41 separate . His company Handley Page Limited was best known for its large aircraft such as the Handley Page 0/400 and Halifax bombers and the HP42 airliner. Crash landed near. Aircraft of the first batch of fifty Mk I Halifaxes were designated Mk I Series I. 10 Squadron RAF based at Melbourne, Yorkshire, gain height in the failing evening light while outward bound on a raid to Turin, Italy. Handley Page were initially disappointed with the performance of the Halifax which was below their predictions,[14] much of this was because they had under estimated the aircraft's drag. 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