In the years directly after World War II the British were afraid that the United States might return to pre-war isolationism and began development of their own nuclear strike force.
The first British atomic bomb was tested in 1952. By 1953 they had an operational atomic bomb, code named "Blue Danube". The only thing they were missing was something to deliver it with.
Avro Vulcan preparing for launch.
The original Air Ministry specification from 1947 was for a medium bomber capable of carrying a 10,000 pound warhead a distance of 1,500 nautical miles from a base anywhere in the world. It was to have a ceiling of 50,000 feet and a cruise speed of 500 knots. It was to be at least the equal of anything the United States or Soviet Union had.
That's a pretty tall order for 1947 but Britain had the aircraft industry to do it. In some ways they were ahead of the United States. Some of their designers were especially talented although they lagged in materials and manufacturing practices. This would prove troublesome for some otherwise promising designs.
Today we take large jets for granted but in 1947 this was cutting edge technology. Deciding to hedge their bets and place orders for three different aircraft. The first two, the Handley-Page Victor and Avro Vulcan were extremely advanced designs for the time. Just in case either of those ran into development issues the also ordered the more conventional Vickers-Armstrongs Valiant.
The largely forgotten Vickers Valiant
The Valiant is the "forgotten" V bomber. Of the three sisters, the Vulcan is the pretty, popular one. The Victor is the quirky eccentric one. The Valiant would be the conservative, business-like one.
Valiant in white reflective paint scheme.
The Valiant was the first to become operational starting in 1954. It was a high wing aircraft with a mildly swept wing and four Rolls-Royce Avon turbojets buried in the wing root. It had a ceiling of 55,000 feet and a top speed of .84 Mach. Cruise speed was around .75 Mach. From a size standpoint it was roughly equivalent to a B-47.
The Valiant had a very strange looking main gear. This was presumably to keep the wing cross section thin.
The Valiant was the first of the V bombers to see combat. During the Suez Crisis of 1956 RAF Valiants staged out of Malta and bombed Egyptian airfields from high altitude. The results were disappointing but did show that Britain had a global strike capability.
A group of Valiants deployed somewhere tropical.
The only Valiant cockpit photo I was able to find.
The Valiant had a fairly short career arc that otherwise mirrored that of its sisters. High altitude bomber, low altitude bomber and finally tanker. The destruction of Gary Powers' U-2 over the Soviet Union in 1960 was a game changer for American, French and British war planners. High altitude bombers were seen as vulnerable and a switch was made to low altitude tactics.
Navigator's compartment of a Valiant.
Yellow Sun hydrogen bomb. The blunt nose was to slow the bomb's descent and give the bomber time to get away. US bombs used parachutes for the same purpose.
This was a problem for the Valiant fleet. Although capable of low-level flight, they quickly started developing wing cracks. In one instance a Valiant with less than 500 total flying hours was scrapped after cracking a rear wing spar. To put that in perspective, some of the 757s I fly have over 88,000 hours on them.
Valiant in landing configuration showing its odd main gear.
The Valiant fleet was deemed too expensive to repair and they were all scrapped in 1965. Ironically, there had been an experimental Valiant B.2 variant that was optimized for low-level flight and would have been better in that mission than any of the other V bombers. It was scrapped in 1958. One of many "might have beens" in British post war aircraft development.
Victor B.1 in white high altitude paint scheme.
Being the eccentric that I am, my favorite of the three is the Victor. Not most people's first choice I realize but it's just so funky looking.
Only the British could have built this thing. I think the front of it looks like a Flash Gordon rocket ship from the old TV shows that were still in reruns when I was a kid.
The inspiration for the Victor?
The Victor was an ambitious design with a crescent-shaped wing and sharply swept T-tail with a very pronounced dihedral. The original B.1 version had four Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire turbojets mounted in the wing root, making 11,000 lbs of thrust a piece. The improved B.2 version used Rolls Royce Conway turbofans which were rated at 17,000 lbs each.
Victor on landing roll. Note the large clamshell speed brakes at the rear.
There were early failures, one prototype was lost when the tail structure failed on a low-level run. Once the bugs were worked out of it the Victor entered service in 1958 as the last of the V bombers. Its flying characteristics were exceptional. One was barrel rolled and even looped at an airshow. It was quite stable all the way up to its top speed of .98 Mach. On more than one occasion Victors broke the sound barrier in shallow dives.
Victor tanker showing off its unique crescent shaped wing.
As a bomber it could carry a single "Yellow Sun" thermonuclear bomb or up to 35,000 pounds of conventional bombs. Later it was adapted to carry a "Blue Steel" standoff nuclear missile. It reportedly had a very capable electronic warfare suite for the time period.
Navigator's compartment of a Victor. Only the pilots had ejection seats.
Blue Steel missile. It had a range of 150 miles and an advanced for its day inertial guidance system.
As with the Valiant, the switch to low level tactics proved to be a problem for the Victor. It reportedly had a very smooth ride down low but by 1968 the fleet was starting to develop wing cracks. It continued on in a strategic reconnaissance role and as a tanker until 1993.
You can't get any more British than a Victor refueling a pair of Lightnings.
Victor cockpit. This looks like a tanker version based on the large fuel panel in the center.
The Victor never actually saw combat as a bomber but as a tanker it supported the "Black Buck" bombing missions in the Falklands. Victors also flew long range reconnaissance missions in the Falklands. It ended its career flying tanker missions during Desert Storm, making it the longest lived of the V bombers. The last official flight was in 1993 but in 2003 one accidentally became airborne during a high-speed taxi run at an airshow.
Victor tanker in Desert Storm colors. The large "Elephant Ear" scoops were for the Ram Air Turbines in case of electric or hydraulic failure.
The second and most radical of the V bombers was of course the Avro Vulcan. The Vulcan belongs on any list of coolest aircraft ever built. I've loved it since I saw it featured in the James Bond movie Thunderball back in the 1960s.
Everybody's favorite, the Vulcan in a unique head on shot.
So much has been written about the Vulcan that there's little I can add to it but I'll try.
The Vulcan was a truly radical design for the time. A large tailless delta wing powered by four Rolls Royce Olympus turbojets. An improved version of the Olympus, with "reheat" as the Brits call afterburners, went on to power Concorde. Note that it's always just "Concorde" and not "the Concorde". Don't ask me why.
One of the most photographed aircraft ever. The Vulcan's radical delta wing gave it impressive handling.
An added benefit of the Vulcan's unique shape was that it was fairly stealthy for its time.
For all that has been written about the Vulcan I can find maddeningly little about what is was actually like to fly. Based on its airshow performances it had very impressive climb capability and equally impressive low speed handling. It did have a tendency to tuck its nose as it approached its top speed of .96 mach. An automatic mach trimmer was added to compensate. Its low altitude speed was limited to 350 knots, a good bit slower than a B-52. I would expect that large wing would have given the crew a pretty good pounding on a low-level run.
The Vulcan shows off its exceptional takeoff and climb abilities.
Operationally the Vulcan was designed to get some quick hits in before the B-52s came in and batted cleanup. A Vulcan could start and takeoff in a very short time and could operate from a 5000 foot runway. It could make it to its target without requiring pre-strike air refueling. All this means that the Vulcans were probably going to get airborne and some of them would likely reach their targets.
Vulcan with bomb doors open. Don't mess with the Empire.
I've never seen one fly and sadly never will. The civilian owned XH558 made its last flight in 2014. I believe they wore out their last set of Olympus engines and no replacements are available.
The Olympus engines did smoke a bit as seen here. This was a problem for B-52s as well.
I have crawled inside one of these. We had one in our museum at Barksdale and I schmoozed the curator into letting me sit in the Vulcan. Now a B-52 is a very cramped aircraft but a Vulcan makes a B-52 look roomy. You pretty much put this thing on and wear it. The two pilots sit upstairs, in ejection seats. Visibility is pretty poor. The forward windows are way ahead of you and the side windows are two small portholes. Everything in the cockpit is in miniature. The throttles are tiny. The fuel panel hinges out from under the throttle quadrant as has tiny switches on it. The two navigators and the electronics officer sat downstairs, facing backwards.
The very cramped cockpit of a Vulcan.
The Vulcan's most famous moment came during the Falklands war when Vulcans based from Ascension Island bombed the airfield at Port Stanley. At the time these were the longest bombing missions ever flown. The main strike force was composed of a single Vulcan bomber and
eleven Victor tankers to get it to the target. A spare Vulcan and three spare Victors comprised the reserve flight. The missions were 16 hours long. Having sat that long in a B-52, I can't imagine sitting in a Vulcan for that amount of time. Actually I can't imagine sitting in a B-52 for that amount of time but I was young and stupid back then.
It's a tight fit and not much visibility out the windows.
The downstairs crew had no ejection seats, as was the case with all the V bombers. Apparently the RAF didn't care much for navigators. While there were instances where the entire crew escaped from a stricken V bomber, there were several others where only the pilots got out alive. At least my B-52 navigators had downwards ejection seats which were better than nothing. If I could zoom the aircraft to 500 feet they at least had a chance of getting out.
Here is a really nice panoramic display of the Vulcan cockpit.
The V bomber fleet was supposed to have been equipped with the US built Skybolt missile which would have given it an improved stand-off strike capability. The later versions of the Vulcan were actually built with the external pylons to carry Skybolt. When MacNamara cancelled the Skybolt project the British were able to work a deal where they acquired Polaris submarine launched ballistic missiles. To this day SLBMs remain the mainstay of the British nuclear force although they maintain tactical nukes for their Tornado fighter-bombers.
The Skybolt air launched ballistic missile never made it to production.
Overall the V bombers, especially the Vulcan and Victor were very advanced medium bombers for the time. They were certainly superior to our B-47, which had some awful handling quirks and killed many a SAC crew. To this day the British are quite proud of their achievement with the V bombers as well they should be.
End of the line for the V bombers. XH558 made its last flight in 2014.