Westland Lysander III (SD). An example of the type used for special missions into occupied France during World War II. (Flying example in the Shuttleworth Collection, 2004.)

The Westland Lysander was a British army co-operation and liaison aircraft used in the Second World War. It achieved fame through its ability to operate from short stretches of unprepared airstrip and its clandestine missions to plant or retrieve agents behind enemy lines, particularly in Nazi-occupied France. Like other British army air co-operation aeroplanes, it was given the name of a military leader, in this case, the Spartan Lysander. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2048x979, 1191 KB) Westland Lysander aircraft Wesland Lysander, flying example at Shuttleworth, 2004, taken & submitted by Paul Maritz (Delete all revisions of this file) (cur) 19:01, 16 April 2005 . ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2048x979, 1191 KB) Westland Lysander aircraft Wesland Lysander, flying example at Shuttleworth, 2004, taken & submitted by Paul Maritz (Delete all revisions of this file) (cur) 19:01, 16 April 2005 . ... // History The Shuttleworth Collection at the Old Warden Airfield in Bedfordshire, England, home of that Richard Ormonde Shuttleworth was started when he was 21. ... Westland Aircraft was a British aircraft manufacturer located in Yeovil in Somerset, formed just before the start of World War II. During the war the company produced a number of generally unsuccessful designs, but their Lysander would serve as an important liaison aircraft with the RAF. After the war the... A liaison aircraft is a small aircraft used by military forces for flying from airbase to airbase, typically ferrying commanders. ... Mushroom cloud from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rising 18 km into the air. ... National Socialism redirects here. ... Lysander (d. ...

Design and development

In 1934, the Air Ministry issued the Specification A.39/34 for an army co-operation aircraft to replace the Hawker Hector. Initially, Hawker, Avro, and Bristol were invited to submit designs, but after some debate within the Ministry, a submission from Westland was invited as well. The Westland design, internally designated P.8, was the work of Arthur Davenport under the direction of "Teddy" Petter. It was Petter's second aircraft design and he spent much time interviewing RAF pilots to find out what they wanted from such an aircraft, suggesting that field of view, low-speed handling characteristics, and STOL performance were the most important factors. This is a list of aviation-related events from 1934: Events January Soviet pilots Fedossenko, Wassenko and Usyskin take the stratosphere-balloon Ossoaviachim I to 22,000 m (72,160 ft). ... The Air Ministry was formerly a department of the United Kingdom Government, established in 1918 with the responsibility of managing the affairs of the (then newly formed) Royal Air Force. ... This is a partial list of the British Air Ministry specifications for aircraft. ... The Hawker Hector was intended as a replacement for the Hawker Audax Army co-operation aircraft. ... Hawker-Siddeley was a British aircraft manufacturing company. ... Avro 504K. Avro was a British aircraft manufacturer, well known for planes such as the Avro Lancaster which served in World War II. One of the worlds first aircraft builders, A.V.Roe and Company was established at Brownsfield Mills, Manchester, England by Alliot Verdon Roe and his brother... Bristol Aeroplane Company logo The Bristol Aeroplane Company (formerly British and Colonial Aeroplane Company) was a major British aircraft company which, in 1959, merged with several major British aircraft companies, to become the British Aircraft Corporation and later still part of British Aerospace, now BAE Systems. ... Westland Aircraft was a British aircraft manufacturer located in Yeovil in Somerset, formed just before the start of World War II. During the war the company produced a number of generally unsuccessful designs, but their Lysander would serve as an important liaison aircraft with the RAF. After the war the... William Edward Willoughby Petter (1908-1968) known as Teddy was an English aircraft designer. ... The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the air force branch of the British Armed Forces. ... STOL is an acronym for Short Take-Off and Landing, used in the aircraft industry to describe airplanes with very short runway requirements. ...

Davenport and Petter worked to design an aircraft around the requested features; the result was highly unconventional, and, in 1934, seemingly antiquated. The Lysander featured a Bristol Mercury radial engine, high gull wings and a fixed taildragger landing gear inside huge spats; the spats had mountings for small, removable stub wings that could be used to carry bombs or supply canisters. In appearance it was not dissimilar to the Polish LWS-3 Mewa. Bristol Mercury engine The Mercury was a 9 cylinder one_row radial aircraft engine that was developed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company in 1925, as their Bristol Jupiter was reaching the end of its lifespan. ... Radial engine in a cut-away view. ... The gull-winged PBM Mariner. ... The Piper Super Cub is a popular taildragger aircraft. ... Spats are a type of shoe accessory. ... The LWS-3 Mewa was the Polish observation and close reconnaissance aircraft, designed in the late-1930s by the LWS factory. ...

It was equipped with automatic wing slats and flaps, novel features for the era. It also featured the largest Elektron alloy extrustion made at the time: a single piece inside the spats supporting the landing gear wheels. The Air Ministry requested two prototypes of the P.8 and the competing Bristol Type 148, and quickly selected the Westland aircraft for production, issuing a contract in September 1936. Slats are small aerodynamic surfaces on the leading edge of an airplane wing which, when deployed, allow the wing to operate at a higher angle of attack. ... The word Flap can refer to several things. ... Elektron is the trademark of a set of magnesium alloys produced by Magnesium Elektron Corporation. ... This is a list of aviation-related events from 1936: Events February February 13 - Imperial Airways commences airmail services to West Africa March March 23 - Impreial Airways begins scheduled flights between Hong Kong and Malaysia. ...

Operational service

The first Lysanders entered service in June 1938 equipping squadrons for "Army Co-operation" and were initially used for message-dropping and artillery spotting. When war broke out in Europe, the earlier Mk Is had been largely replaced by the Mk IIs, the older machines heading for the Middle East. Four regular squadrons equipped with Lysanders accompanied the British Expeditionary Force to France. These were put into action as spotters and light bombers, and despite occasional victories against German aircraft they made very easy pickings for the Luftwaffe unless well escorted. Almost half the Lysanders operating in and over France were lost, and with the fall of France the type was quickly withdrawn from its original role. Back in England some went to work operating air-sea rescue for RAF pilots in the English Channel. Fourteen squadrons and flights were formed for this work during 1940/1941, dropping dinghys to downed pilots. This is a list of aviation-related events from 1938: Events Imperial Airways inaugurates scheduled service from London to Montreal. ... The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) was the British army sent to France and Belgium in World War I and British Forces in Europe from 1939 - 1940 during World War II. The BEF was established by Secretary of State for War Richard Haldane following the Second Boer War in case the... The Deutsche Luftwaffe or   (German: air force, literally Air Weapon, IPA: ) is the commonly used term for the German air force. ...

In August 1941, a new squadron, No. 138 (Special Duties), was formed to operate missions for the Special Operations Executive to maintain contact with the French Resistance. Among its aircraft were Lysander IIIs, which would fly over and land in France. While general supply drops could be left to the rest of No. 138's aircraft, the Lysander could smuggle agents on and off the continent, or bringing back members of downed aircrews that had been sheltered by the French. In this role, the Lysander was outstanding, and it continued in this capacity until the liberation of France. Flying on moonless nights and without navigation equipment other than a map and a compass, landing on short strips of land marked out by a couple of torches, the pilots of No. 138 and later No. 161 Squadron delivered 101 and recovered 128 agents from occupied Europe (Gunston 1995). The Lysanders were painted matt black and flew from secret airfields at Newmarket and Tempsford but used regular RAF stations to fuel up for the actual crossing. No. ... The Special Operations Executive (SOE), sometimes referred to as the Baker Street Irregulars after Sherlock Holmess fictional group of spies, was a World War II organization initiated by Winston Churchill and Hugh Dalton in July 1940 as a mechanism for conducting warfare by means other than direct military engagement. ... Bold textItalic textLink title // Headline text Headline text Headline text == The cross of Lorraine used by the French Resistance as a symbolic reference to Joan of Arc. ... No. ... Statistics Population: 14,995 (2001 Census) Ordnance Survey OS grid reference: TL645636 Administration District: Forest Heath Shire county: Suffolk Region: East of England Constituent country: England Sovereign state: United Kingdom Other Ceremonial county: Suffolk Historic county: Suffolk Services Police force: Suffolk Constabulary Ambulance service: East of England Post office and... RAF Tempsford was perhaps the most secret RAF airfield in World War II. It was home to the Special Duties Squadrons, 138, which dropped Special Operations Executive agents and their supplies into occupied Europe, and 161, which specialised in personnel delivery and retrieval by landing in occupied Europe. ...

The Lysander also joined the ranks of the Forces Aériennes Françaises Libres (FAFL) - the Free French air force - when Groupe Mixte de Combat (GMC) 1, formed at RAF Odiham on August 29, 1940, was sent to French North-West Africa in order both to persuade the authorities in countries like Gabon, Cameroon and Chad, which were still loyal to Vichy France, to join the Gaullist cause against the Axis powers, and to attack Italian ground forces in Libya. As with all FAFL aircraft, the Lysanders sported the Cross of Lorraine insignia on the fuselage and the wings, as opposed to the tricolor roundel first used in 1914, in order to distinguish their aircraft from those flying for the Vichy French air force. The Lysanders were mostly employed on reconnaissance missions but were also employed to carry out occasional attacks. RAF Odiham crest RAF Odiham is a Royal Air Force station situated a little to the south of the historic small town of Odiham in Hampshire, England. ... August 29 is the 241st day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (242nd in leap years), with 124 days remaining. ... Year 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1940 calendar). ... For other uses of Vichy, see Vichy (disambiguation). ... Gaullism is a French political ideology based on the thought and action of Charles de Gaulle. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Cross of Lorraine The Cross of Lorraine, ‡, is a heraldic cross, the double cross, consists of a vertical line, crossed by two smaller horizontal bars. ...

The type also filled other, less glamorous roles such as target-towing and communication aircraft. It was also licence-built in Canada to fill these roles. All British Lysanders were withdrawn from service in 1946. This is a list of aviation-related events from 1946: // Events January January 1 - a British South American Airways Avro Lancastrian becomes the first commercial flight to depart Heathrow Airport January 10 - a Sikorsky R5 sets an unofficial helicopter altitude record of 6,400 m (21,000 ft) at Stratford...

Export customers of the type included Finland, Ireland, Turkey, Portugal, the United States and Egypt. Egyptian Lysanders were the last to see active service, against Israel in the War of Independence in 1948. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War, called the War of Independence by Israelis and al Nakba the catastrophe by Arabs, was the first in a series of wars in the Arab-Israeli conflict. ...

A total of 1,786 were built, including 225 Canadian examples.

Variants

• Lysander Mk I - Powered by one 664-kW (890-hp) Mercury XII radial piston engine. Two forward-firing 0.303 in (7.7-mm) Browning machine guns in wheel fairings and one pintle-mounted Lewis or Vickers K gun for the observer. Stub wings, if fitted, carried 500 lb (227 kg) of bombs. Four 20 lb (9 kg) bombs could be carried under rear fuselage.
• Lysander Mk TT.Mk 1 - Lysander Mk 1s converted into target tugs.
• Lysander Mk II - Powered by one 675-kW (905-hp) Bristol Perseus XII radial piston engine.
• Lysander TT MK II - Target tug conversion of the Lysander Mk II.
• Lysander Mk III - Powered by one 649-kW (870-hp) Bristol Mercury XX or 30 radial piston engine, 350 delivered from July 1940. Twin 7.7-mm (0.303-inch) Browning machine guns in the rear cockpit for the observer.
• Lysander Mk IIIA - Similar to the Lysander Mk I. Twin 7.7-mm (0.303-inch) Lewis machine guns in the rear cockpit for the observer.
• Lysander Mk IIISCW - Special version for clandestine operations. No armament, long range fuel tank, fixed external ladder.
• Lysander TT Mk III - Lysander Mk Is, Mk IIs and Mk IIIs converted into target tugs.
• Lysander TT M IIIA - 100 new target tugs.

203. ...

Operators

Main article: List of Westland Lysander operators

The Lysander served with Royal Air Force, Royal Canadian Air Force and Royal Indian Air Force units as both the primary aircraft and in a secondary liaison and communications role. It was also used by Australia, Canada, Eire (Ireland), Egypt, Finland, France, Poland, Portugal, South Africa, Turkey, United Kingdom Royal Navy, (Fleet Air Arm, Royal Air Force), and the United States. The following are units which operated the Westland Lysander: // No. ... Map of Éire Éire (pronounced AIR uh, in the Irish language, translated as Ireland) is the name given in Article 4 of the 1937 Irish constitution to the 26-county Irish state, created under the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty, which was known between 1922 and 1937 as the Irish Free... The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British armed services (and is therefore the Senior Service). ... The Fleet Air Arm is the operational group of the Royal Navy responsible for the operation of the aircraft on board their ships. ... The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the air force branch of the British Armed Forces. ...

Survivors

A small number are preserved in museums in the UK and Canada and elsewhere. The National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution, in the Udvar-Hazy Center located in the Chantilly, Virgina suburb of Washington DC near Dulles International Airport has a Westland Lysander IIIA on display, painted in the markings of No. 138 Squadron RAF (famed for their clandestine missions in wartime Europe). To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The Interior of the Udvar-Hazy Center The Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center is the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum (NASM)s annex at Washington Dulles International Airport in Chantilly, Virginia. ... Flag Seal Nickname: DC, The District Motto: Justitia Omnibus (Justice for All) Location Location of Washington, D.C., with regard to the surrounding states of Maryland and Virginia. ... Aerial photo Washington Dulles International Airport (IATA airport code IAD, ICAO airport code KIAD) serves the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area. ... No. ...

Specifications (Lysander Mk III)

General characteristics

• Crew: One, pilot
• Capacity: 1 passenger (or observer)
• Length: 30 ft 6 in (9.29 m)
• Wingspan: 50 ft 0 in (15.24 m)
• Height: 11 ft 6 in (3.50 m)
• Wing area: 260 ft² (24.2 m²)
• Empty weight: 4,044 lb (1,834 kg)
• Loaded weight: 5,833 lb (2,645 kg)
• Max takeoff weight: 6,305 lb (2,866 kg)
• Powerplant: 1× Bristol Mercury XX , 870 hp (649 kW)

Performance

• Maximum speed: 212 mph (341 km/h)
• Range: 600 miles (966 km)
• Service ceiling: 21,500 ft (6,550 m)
• Rate of climb: 1,410 ft/min (7.2 m/s)
• Wing loading: 22 lb/ft² (109 kg/m²)
• Power/mass: 0.15 hp/lb (250 W/kg)

Armament

• 1× .303 Lewis gun for observer

The distance AB is the wing span of this Aer Lingus Airbus A320. ... In aviation, the Maximum Take-Off Weight (or MTOW) is the maximum weight with which an aircraft is allowed to try to achieve flight. ... Bristol Mercury engine The Mercury was a 9 cylinder one_row radial aircraft engine that was developed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company in 1925, as their Bristol Jupiter was reaching the end of its lifespan. ... VNO of an aircraft is the V speed which refers to the velocity of normal operation. ... The maximal total range is the distance an aircraft can fly between takeoff and landing as limited by its fuel capacity. ... In aeronautics, the service ceiling is the maximum density altitude where the best rate of climb airspeed will produce a 100 feet per minute climb(twin engine) and 50 feet(single engine) at maximum weight while in a clean configuration with maximum continuous power. ... This page is a candidate to be moved to Wiktionary. ... In aerodynamics, wing loading is the loaded weight of the aircraft divided by the area of the wing. ... Power-to-weight ratio is a measure commonly used when comparing various vehicles (or engines), including automobiles, motorcycles and aircraft. ... .303 cartridge The . ... The Lewis Gun was a pre-WWI era American design of machine gun most widely used by the British Empire and Imperial armies that continued to see service all the way through to WWII, it first saw combat with the Belgian Army in WWI. It is visually distinctive because of...

References

• Donald, D. and Lake, J. (eds.) Encyclopedia of World Military Aircraft. London: AIRtime Publishing, 1996. ISBN 1-880588-24-2.
• Gunston, B. Classic World War II Aircraft Cutaways. London: Osprey, 1995. ISBN 1-85532-526-8.

Related content

Comparable aircraft

• Fieseler Fi 156 Storch
• L-4 Grasshopper
• Henschel Hs 126

Designation sequence

• Wallace - P.8 (Lysander) - P.9 (Whirlwind) - P.11 - P.12 - Westland Welkin - W.34 (Wyvern)

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