Hawker Hunter

what is it?

The Hawker Hunter is a transonic British jet-powered fighter aircraft that was developed by Hawker Aircraft for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It was designed to take advantage of the newly developed Rolls-Royce Avon turbojet engine and the swept wing, and was the first jet-powered aircraft produced by Hawker to be procured by the RAF. On 7 September 1953, the modified first prototype broke the world air speed record for aircraft, achieving a speed of 727.63 mph (1,171.01 km/h; 632.29 kn). The single-seat Hunter was introduced to service in 1954 as a manoeuvrable day interceptor aircraft, quickly succeeding first-generation jet fighters in RAF service such as the Gloster Meteor and the de Havilland Venom.

🔎How to recognise it: 1 jet engine · 10.3 m wingspan

base stats

• speed 1,002 km/htop speed
• size 11.2 tmax take-off weight
• built 1,972made in total

Bars compare against all aircraft: 3,500 km/h, 20,000 km, 850 seats; size and number built on a log scale up to 640 t (An-225) and 45,000 built (Cessna 172).

fun facts

• 🎂First flew 75 years ago, in 1951.
• 🏎️Top speed is 7.7× a car on the Dutch motorway (130 km/h).
• 🚗Wingspan of 10.3 m: about 2 cars parked nose to tail.
• 🏔️Can fly 1.7× higher than Mount Everest (8,849 m).

jet: Gas turbine pushing air out the back (turbofan or turbojet): fast and high-flying.

spec sheet

first flight

1951-07-21

introduced

1956

status

still flying

number built

1,972

role

fighter-bomber

origin

🇬🇧 United Kingdom

makers

Hawker Siddeley

engines

1× Rolls-Royce Avon 207

crew

1

length

14 m

wingspan

10.3 m

height

4 m

max take-off weight

11.2 t

top speed

1,002 km/h

range

—

ceiling

15,240 m

Specs are for the version in the Wikipedia article's specification section. Blank means the sources don't say.