"Hurricane Rash"

CCLXXXVII

The Hurricane By The Numbers*

• Number constructed:   14,583 (plus an unknown number of Soviet copies).

After the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union in the summer of 1941, Winston Churchill found himself with a strange new bedfellow: Josef Stalin. Although he hated Communism, Churchill declared that he would make “a friend of the devil in hell if it means defeating Hitler”; the U.K. began shipping Hurricanes to Russia. Not only were they winter weatherized, but the Soviets created a whole raft of variants of their own

• Production history:       1937 – 1944. The Hurricane was manufactured both in England and in Canada.

One of the great advantages of the Hawker Hurricane was its quick turn-around time. A skilled Hawker ground crew could refuel the plane, check the oil, and kick the tires in six minutes. Then the pilot was off for another sortie. Here, a Hurricane is being re-armed during the Battle of France

• Squadrons:          32 during the Battle of Britain.

Due to its simple construction the engine panels could be removed in under a minute and engine service could be performed right on the battlefield. This is a Hurricane Mk 1, to judge from the arrangement of the guns

• Variants:     Including the Sea Hurricane (or “Hurricat”) there were 26 “Marks” or variants of the Hawker Hurricane, numbered Mark I through Mark XIIA. The numbering of the Marks was sequential, but not always numerical; for example, Mark IID. The Mark numbers were sometimes repeated in the Sea Hurricane series ---- A Mark III Hurricane and a Mark III Sea Hurricane.

While not as popular a subject as the Spitfire, aviation aficionadoes love the Hurricane also,  and many replica kits, RC kits, and model kits exist. This pilotable replica is 72% of the size of an original

• Since the Hurricane was of relatively simple construction the Hurricane was easy to modify and small “un-Marked” changes ran into the hundreds. Some were unique to one plane or a small number of planes. The Hilson FH.40, for example, was a biplane variant with fuel tanks in the top wing. It was, in effect, a reinvented Hawker Fury, the plane the Hurricane was based on. Only the prototype was constructed.

The Hilson FH.40 biplane variant

• Major adaptations:     

    The Sea Hurricane, a Hurricane modified for catapult launches        from ships, and later from the Royal Navy’s smaller aircraft carriers. 

This Trop is distinctively camouflaged. The sand filter under the nose can just be seen behind the propeller blade

     The Trop, adapted for use in North Africa and in torrid zones. The Trop had a special sand filter installed beneath the nose, and was otherwise weatherized to minimize deterioration (such as canvas rot and wood frame warping) due to climatic conditions.

A Soviet two-seat “artillery spotter”. Many of the Russian variants were unlicensed  home-built aircraft based on the Hawker design

• 1,017 fighter aircraft (of all types) and 520 RAF fighter pilots (in total) were killed in the Battle of Britain.

The Sea Hurricane was a shipboard variant which was launched by catapult. It was sometimes called the “Hurricat” as a result. The idea was sound but it was rushed into service due to the exigencies of war, and so the original Hurricats were just modified landplanes. They often suffered structural damage from the violence of the catapult, and sometimes they came apart shortly after being launched.  Another drawback: Until Britain began building smaller tactical aircraft carriers, Hurricats could not manage shipboard landings. These early Hurricats frequently did not have the range to return to land and would ditch. The pilots were then (hopefully) picked up by Air-Sea Rescue. Sometimes the planes were salvageable. Being a Hurricat pilot in the early days was obviously not a plum job in the RAF. Hawker quickly began building reinforced longer-range Hurricats as a result. They were in many respects a different aircraft altogether from the Hurricane. A Hurricat was recognizable due to the air scoop on the underbelly of the plane

•  Officially, the Hurricane’s operational life stretched from 1938 to 1944. The last Hurricane left the factory in 1944 as a bit of a white elephant. By 1944, the wood-and-canvas airplane was anomalous in design. Much more powerful and longer range all-metal aircraft had taken its place, like the P-51 Mustang and the P-47 Thunderbolt. Both were heavily armored, unlike the Hurricane. Structurally, Hurricanes were increasingly vulnerable to improved incendiary bullets as the war went on, and had been taken out of combat roles (in Europe). At least one Hurricane, however, flew on D-Day. Hurricanes were active in every theatre of the war, however, and were still in use in the China-Burma-India (CBI) Theatre up to 1945, as well as being in scattered use elsewhere.  After the war they were not sought by smaller air forces as the Spitfire was, and many were scrapped.

The cockpit of a Hawker Hurricane Mk 2

• Currently extant Hurricanes: 13 airworthy. Scores of museum examples also exist.

While it is hardly unusual for wartime enemies to capture each  others’ aircraft and study them or use them for training purposes it is less usual that the planes get used in actual combat. However the Axis used captured Hurricanes in battle, a testament to the airworthiness of the Hawker design

• During the war the Hurricane was used by 25 air forces, those of Australia, Belgium, Canada, Egypt, France, Finland, Germany, Greece, British Raj, Iran, Ireland, Italy, Japan, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Union of South Africa, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Turkey, United Kingdom, and the competing Royal and Communist governments of Yugoslavia. Latvia had bought a squadron’s worth of Hurricanes, but the country was occupied by the U.S.S.R. in 1940, and the planes were never delivered to the buyer. However, Hurricanes were sent to Russia during the war, and it is possible that a few of aircraft intended for Latvia reached the Soviet Union.

During World War II, Ireland (the Irish Free State) was in an anomalous political position. While it was a member of the British Commonwealth the country charted its own political course, and had declared itself neutral, a position it held (officially) throughout the war. The country was sharply divided over the war; many Irish, having just recently attained a pseudo-independence from their traditional enemy, the U.K., supported Germany, passively or actively. Others not only rejected German ideas but fought in the war under British command.  The Axis was just as confused. Stories of U-boats using secret Irish bases along the Atlantic coastline are too numerous to ignore, and yet the Luftwaffe bombed Campile in County Wexford during the Battle of Britain. The Free State was armed by Great Britain; its Hurricanes sported a “Yin-Yang” roundel in orange and green

• The Hurricane has the distinction of having been used in combat by both the Allies and the Axis. When Germany overran France, a number of Hurricanes fell into Luftwaffe hands and were used as warplanes. Germany’s allies Finland and Romania also received a small number of Hurricanes from Germany.

Finland was also in an anomalous political position during the war. Once a Russian imperial province, it was invaded by the Soviet Union in 1939. Stalin intended to annex the country, but the Finns put up such a heroic resistance (“The Winter War” of 1939 -1940) that the U.S.S.R. was thrown back and accepted territorial concessions in lieu of outright annexation. The Winter War caused Finland to side with Germany against Russia in 1941, but the Finns were always uncomfortable Axis partners. In 1944, with the Nazis losing ground, Finland switched sides and joined the Allies. As a symol of the sun Finland’s traditional symbol has always been the swastika, even until today, and its use by Finns has nothing to do with Naziism

• Per Unit Cost:     £ 10,500 (about $785,000.00 in 2019 value). However, purchasing an original Hurricane today costs upward of $2.1 million due to their rarity.

A wrecked Hawker Hurricane without its skin on. The simplicity of its wooden frame is evident

• Crew:   1

• Weight (empty):           5,658 lbs.

• Weight (loaded):          8,470 lbs.

• Speed:        340 miles per hour

• Length:      31’4”

• Wingspan: 40’0”

• Height:       13’0”

• Combat radius:   468 miles

• Ferry distance:     1,090 miles with twin drop tanks

• Service ceiling:    35,000 feet

• Rate of climb:     2,780 feet / minute

• Powerplant:        

    One Rolls-Royce Merlin XX liquid-cooled V-12, 1,185 horsepower.

• Armaments:

   4 x2 .303 Browning submachine guns (Mk 1 and MK 2).           

   2 x2 Hispano 20mm cannons (later Marks). 

   Modifiable to carry 2 bombs (either 500 or 1000 lbs).

RAF Ace Douglas Bader preferred the Hurricane to the Spitfire; it was, he said, “a marvelous gun platform,” steady and dependable. Bader later lost his legs

• Built largely of Hawker Fury parts and a wooden shell over a steel tubular frame, replacement parts were easy to find, and repairs were easy. The average repair time for a Hurricane in the Battle of Britain was six minutes, as opposed to 26 minutes for a Spitfire.

Seventy-Five Percent of the British aircraft in the Battle of Britain were Hurricanes. Hurricanes shot down 60% of the enemy aircraft in the battle. But the Hurricane was generally used as a “bomber killer” while the Spitfire was used to kill enemy fighter planes. Since the Spitfire was engaged in the majority of the dogfights, often with the aim of protecting the fleet of Hurricanes, the Spitfire is remembered as the plane. Hurricanes, planes and crews alike, have gotten too short a shrift in the historical memory

• Due to the simple “coat hanger” canvas-over-wood-on-frame construction, battle damage often did not cripple a Hurricane. Flak or German fighters could blow holes in the wings, often significant ones, and the plane would keep flying. As long a repair crews kept stocks of dope, needle and thread, and canvas handy, minor repairs amounted to little more than sewing. Even frame damage was easily repaired by switching out lengths of pipe. Wing Commander James “Stocky” Edwards explained, “I’d give ‘em an ‘urricane, and they’d either prang it or bring it back full of bloody ‘oles.” But especially in the Battle of Britain they almost always flew again.

While it lacked the deftness and speed of the Spitfire, a Hurricane was a good solid dogfighter as long as it could get the drop on a Messerschmitt BF-109. The German plane was faster and more maneuverable, but the Hurricane could withstand more damage and was a more dogged aircraft. Pilots in the Battle of Britain sometimes sortied three or more times a day

• 200 Hurricanes were lost to combat action between the outset of war and the beginning of the Battle of Britain, leading to a front-line “fighter famine.” Given the high rate of loss (especially at Dunkirk) there were fears that the Hurricane pilots would be slaughtered wholesale going up against the Luftwaffe in the summer of 1940, but the pilots and their planes acquitted themselves magnificently, inflicting 60% of the Luftwaffe’s total losses in the Battle of Britain. 

The Junkers 88  (Ju-88) was a versatile medium range bomber. The Luftwaffe had a stable of excellent fighter planes, but Hitler could see little use for long-range heavy bombardment aircraft. Instead, he opted for Schnellbombers, fast-attack craft that could be adapted to multiple uses. The Ju-88 took a beating from the Hurricane during the Battle of Britain. Ju-88 losses over Britain in 1940 totaled 303 aircraft between July and October 1940. In comparison, Dornier DO-17 and Heinkel He-111 losses for the same period were 132 and 252 machines destroyed respectively

• Hurricane pilots were required to use oxygen in flight because exhaust fumes leaked into the cockpit from beyond the firewall, causing Carbon Monoxide poisoning. Despite attempted modifications to the aircraft this problem was never satisfactorily resolved.

A flight of Hurricanes, 1940. A photograph by Wing Commander Roger Morewood

• Hurricanes, being made of wood and doped percale burned furiously when fires began on board. So did the pilots. There was even a name for it: “Hurricane Rash”. 

Flight Leftenant Eric James Brindley Nicholson, V.C.

• The only Victoria Cross awarded during the Battle of Britain was given to James Brindley Nicolson, who stayed in his cockpit in order to shoot down a Messerschmitt Bf-109 while the plane was being engulfed in flames taking him along with it. Like many Hurricanes, he lived to fight again, but was shot down over the Bay of Bengal in May 1945.

Victoria Cross

• On-board fires were not unknown. There were three fuel tanks inside a typical hurricane. Two lay inside the wings at the opposing wing roots, inboard of the wheel wells. They more or less met mid- fuselage under the pilot’s feet. The third tank lay just afore of the control panel, sandwiched between the cockpit and the firewall of the engine compartment. They weren’t easy to target but they could be hit if the plane was raked by enemy bullets.  

A hello from a Hurricane

*The numbers apply to the Battle of Britain veteran Mk 1 and Mk 2 of 1939 -1941, except where otherwise noted