what is it?
The Westland Wasp is a small 1960s British turbine-powered, shipboard anti-submarine helicopter. Produced by Westland Helicopters, it came from the same Saunders-Roe P.531 programme as the British Army Westland Scout, and is based on the earlier piston-engined Saunders-Roe Skeeter. It fulfilled the requirement of the Royal Navy for a helicopter small enough to land on the deck of a frigate and carry a useful load of two homing torpedoes.
How to recognise it: 1 turboshaft engine · 9.8 m main rotor
base stats
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 64 years ago, in 1962.
- Rotor of 9.8 m: about 2 cars parked nose to tail.
turboshaft: A turbine that turns a shaft, usually a helicopter rotor.
spec sheet
- first flight
- 1962-10-28
- introduced
- 1963
- retired
- 2000
- status
- retired
- number built
- 133
- role
- helicopter
- origin
- 🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- makers
- Westland Helicopters
- engines
- 1× Rolls-Royce Nimbus 103
- crew
- 1
- passengers
- 4
- length
- 12.3 m
- rotor diameter
- 9.8 m
- height
- 2.7 m
- max take-off weight
- 2,495 kg
- top speed
- 193 km/h
- cruise speed
- 178 km/h
- range
- 487 km
- ceiling
- 3,719 m
Specs are for the version in the Wikipedia article's specification section. Blank means the sources don't say.
family
Sources: Wikidata Q913508, Wikipedia: Westland Wasp (CC BY-SA 4.0).Updated 2026-10-24.