Frank Whittle - Jim Al-Khalili - Lancelot Law Whyte - Cold War Hot Jets TV - The Genius of Invention TV - Genius of Britain TV - Wings of War TV - Hitler’s Secret Underground Factory aka Nazi Megastructures TV - Andrew Marr TV - Rory McGrath: Industrial Revelations TV - Days that Shook the World TV -
Gentlemen, I give you the Whittle engine. Frank Whittle
The responsibility that rests on my shoulders is very heavy indeed ... either we place a powerful new weapon in the hands of the Royal Air Force or, if we fail to get our results in time, we may have falsely raised hopes and caused action to be taken which may deprive the Royal Air Force of hundreds of [conventional] aircraft that it badly needs ... I have a good crowd round me. They are all working like slaves, so much so, that there is a risk of mistakes through physical and mental fatigue. Frank Whittle
Frank Whittle: a completely new kind of engine … He came up with this: the jet engine. Jim Al-Khalili, Revolutions: The Ideas that Changed the World I: The Aeroplane, BBC 2019
The impression he [Whittle] made was overwhelming. I have never been so quickly convinced, or so happy to find one’s highest standards met ... This was genius, not talent. Whittle expressed his idea with superb conciseness: ‘Reciprocating engines are exhausted. They have hundreds of parts jerking to and fro, and they cannot be made more powerful without becoming too complicated. The engine of the future must produce 2,000 hp with one moving part: a spinning turbine and compressor.’ Lancelot Law Whyte
Astonishing machines flying at incredible speeds, and all powered by what seemed to be a technology from the future. That technology was a British invention. Cold War, Hot Jets, BBC 2013
The jet engine was a lucrative export. ibid.
The Comet put Britain years ahead of the rest of the world. ibid.
Britain once again turned to its aviation industry for its next generation of war machines. Cold War, Hot Jets II
The role of the jet bomber was set to dominate the political landscape for the next two decades. ibid.
The Vulcan was unveiled at the Farnborough Air Show. ibid.
The V bombers were so advanced it took a crew of five highly trained men to fly them. ibid.
The bomb had become a bargaining tool. ibid.
The campaign for nuclear disarmament had begun. ibid.
Britain’s strategic nuclear deterrent was handed to the Royal Navy. ibid.
The jet age had made the world a smaller place. ibid.
In 1930 he [Whittle] patented his design for the world’s first jet engine. The Genius of Invention II: Speed, BBC 2013
Suck – Squeeze – Bang - Blow = thrust out the back. ibid.
The modern jet engine contains thousands of parts. ibid.
Frank Whittle: May 15th 1941: The test flight of Britain’s first jet. Genius of Britain IV, Dyson, Channel 4 2010
The race to build the world’s first jet engine. The first combat-ready jet plane that could have helped the Nazis win the War. Wings of War V: The Jet Engine, Discovery 2019
Perhaps the most iconic jet-powered fighter plane is the British Hawker Siddely Harrier Jump Jet. ibid.
In 1930 Whittle took out a patent on his jet engine design himself. ibid.
In the 1930s England and Germany were in a race to build the world’s first jet engine … Whittle won the race. ibid.
In the race for aerial supremacy the communists and the Migs had just burst into the lead. ibid.
Hidden deep in the forests of Germany, concealed inside vast mountains, lie the remains of one of the most intriguing engineering projects of World War II: vast underground factories built for the world’s first operational jet fighter. This is the incredible story of the ME262. Hitler’s Secret Underground Factory aka Nazi Megastructures, Channel 5 2019
Hitler’s new megaweapon: the Messerschmitt ME262 … The Germans launched the world’s first jet aircraft. ibid.
On 30th June 1953, less than a month after her coronation, Queen Elizabeth walked across the tarmac at London airport. The Queen was there to wave her mother and sister off but also to catch a glimpse of a very exiting new British aeroplane. The De Haviland Comet represented the future, the world’s very first commercial jet airliner … But within a year of the royal flight a series of terrible crashes would ground the Comet fleet and devastate Britain’s lead in the jet age. New Elizabethans with Andrew Marr III: Made in Britain, BBC 2020
The magnificently named Spitfire. Rory McGrath, Industrial Revelations s5e2: Best of British Engineering: Planes, Discovery 2008
Frank Whittle had invented the jet engine ... Sir Frank Whittle’s Gloster Meteor which launched the jet age. ibid.
The Comet was simply the most glamorous plane ever built ... The first Comet was built in 1949 ... In October 1952 a Comet crashed on take-off in Rome: over the next two years five more Comets crashed. In 1954 the Comet was grounded. ibid.
The Harrier has everything a good jet fighter needs. Speed, agility, fire-power ... The Harrier can take off and land vertically. It can hover and manoeuvre in mid-air ... Test flights with the P11-27 began in 1960 ... By 1966 the first Harrier jump jet, the sexiest jet fighter ever built, was in the air. ibid.
Concorde was a step into the unknown ... Concorde is a beautiful memorial to the unassuming smoking cardigan-wearing problem-solvers who are the real heroes of British engineering. It’s just a damn shame she’s been grounded. ibid.
With the arrival of the jet-age in the mid-1940s speeds weren’t solely dreamed of became a reality. Two extraordinary days twenty years apart stand out – Chuck Yeager’s supersonic flight and Donald Campbell’s attempt to become the fastest man on water. Days that Shook the World s1e12: Chuck Yaeger, BBC 2003