Description
Lightning Poster A3, sketched in Pencil.
The English Electric supersonic interceptor (WG760), piloted by Roland Beamont, first flew at Boscombe Down, Wiltshire as the English Electric P1 on 4th August 1954.
Initial designs were led by WEW ‘Teddy’ Petter although the aircraft is mostly credited to his successor Freddie Page (later Sir Frederick Page and Chairman of the Aircraft Group of BAC).
A unique feature of the design was its vertically staggered engine configuration of two Rolls-Royce Avon turbojets, housed within the fuselage. The aircraft was initially conceived as an interceptor, designed to defend airfields housing Britain’s V Force of bombers, comprised of the Avro Vulcan, Handley Page Victor and the Vickers Valiant. It was thought that during the Cold War of the 1960’s these could be vulnerable to attack from the air in any future nuclear conflict.
Petter’s initial design was for an aircraft capable of Mach 1.5 and he determined that as a consequence a conventional 40° swept wing would be required. A proposal was submitted November 1948, and after the project was provisionally accepted by English Electric, it was given the designation P.1 in January 1949
Artworks from the collection of the late Artist Barry Wallond, from St Mawgan in Cornwall. Barry’s artwork included a wide range of WW2 and Post War Royal Air Force aircraft, drawn in Pencil. Barry also created a over 150 computer designed images of aircraft, with details of the individual aircraft portrayed.
