bdk wrote:
Mudge, you be the judge. Which is uglier; The Blackburn Skua or the Fairey Barracuda?
Perhaps better to remember both were flown by brave young men badly let down by those who specified for their aircraft.
The Skua achieved the first sinking of a capital ship by dive-bomber (the cruiser
Königsberg) and was a combined dive-bomber (at which it was successful - long before before any US or Japanese type) and a fleet fighter where it did better than might be expected. It's main weakness was that it was developed to a false premise of the nature of a fleet fighter, and that it didn't have self-sealing fuel tanks...
The Barra, an over-complex and late offering to the dive-bomber role (an equivalent to the Sb-2C Helldiver) was offered for a role that was no longer primary by its service entry. It's big weakness was poisoning pilots with carbon monoxide on service entry, causing a spate of unexplained accidents and an obvious loss of aircrew confidence as a result. The other problem was many pilots converted from the Fairey Swordfish, a remarkably successful anachronistic type, but with benign biplane handling and fixed undercarriage, no flaps, fixed pitch prop etc. The Barra wasn't just complex looking, but compared to a low-tech biplane a lot harder to fly.
Military aircraft may or may not be 'pretty' - a subjective judgement in all cases - but they are all tools for a job and killers.
Just a few thoughts,
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