If we are to name brilliant fighter aircraft, we can’t forget that the line that separates a great success from a mishap is very thin. The saga of aviation is littered with heroes who in one breath conquered the sky and in another treaded the path of notoriety. Some were pioneering yet had significant defects, others were hastily pushed into operational stages without proper testing, and a few were just products of the wrong war era. What is coming next is a glance at ten skywardly-talking cautionary tales.
10. Seversky P-35
The P-35 was America’s prototype of an all-metal single-plane fighter with an enclosed cockpit and retractable landing gear—top-level on paper. But by the outbreak of the Second World War, it had already turned into a has-been. Only 76 were domestic, and a few that were shipped overseas came with manuals in Swedish, instruments in metric, and no spare parts. They were quickly eliminated in the battles in which they were outgunned and obsolete. Even so, the P-35 became the platform for the much more successful P-47 Thunderbolt, confirming that even failures can lead to victories.
9. Messerschmitt Me-210
Germany was counting on the Me-210 to replace the Me-110 as a multi-purpose heavy fighter. Although elegant and powerful to the eye, it was a terrible nightmare to be piloted; it got out of control and was less powerful than the one it was assigned to replace. To make it worse, thousands of orders were made before the prototype had even taken off. The production was stopped after only a few hundred, and the better Me-410 was quickly brought in as a replacement.
8. Focke-Wulf Ta-154 Moskito
The Ta-154 was a wooden night fighter with high hopes for countering Britain’s de Havilland Mosquito, but in reality, it hardly managed to get off the ground – quite literally. The factory that made the special wood glue was bombed by the Allies, and the substitutes caused the plane to break down dangerously. Less than 50 were built, no one has yet to fight, and the magnificent plan slowly faded away.
7. Blackburn B-25 Roc
Roc of England was a child of short-lived admiration for turret fighters. In fact, it was a slow, awkward, and lackluster machine with a heavy gun turret mounted on top of the dive-bomber. It has never been in the forefront and has been pulling duty as a target tug or a static defense gun platform. It is still a prime example of the catastrophic results of design by committee.
6. Curtiss-Wright CW-21 Demon
The CW-21 was advertised as the fastest-climbing interceptor in the world, and yet it was nothing more than a slightly modified trainer. The U.S. military rejected it, but smaller allied countries bought it. When the war broke out, its short life was sealed by a lack of armor, weak armament, and poor survivability. Most of them were destroyed in a matter of weeks. The plane’s deficiencies could not be made up for by speed alone.
5. Caudron C.714
Caudron C.714 was initially designed to be a racing plane, but it was converted into a budget fighter in a hurry. It was poorly built, armed with only four machine guns, and could fly at pretty good speeds, but had short range and low climbing speed. Its retirement from the military force took place almost immediately after its debut, so it never had the chance to fight in real battles. To the pilots, it was more of a sign of frustration rather than a true fighting machine.
4. Lavochkin-Gorbunov-Gudkov LaGG-3
The Soviets made the LaGG-3 out of plywood to conserve metal, but the car was slow, heavy, and rather dangerous. Pilots gave it the appellation “varnished guaranteed coffin,” which is quite a fitting nickname. Several thousand of them had to be flown by the pilots before the much better La-5 appeared. It is a lesson on how neck-high situations lead to desperate solutions.
3. Fiat CR.42 Falco
While the world was dominated by advanced monoplanes, Italy was still hanging onto the biplane. The CR.42 was very maneuverable and user-friendly, but it was quite hopeless against Spitfires and Hurricanes. Production of the Falco went on at full speed, despite Italy having more modern designs, and it thus became a striking example of clinging stubbornly to the past long after it had expired.
2. Brewster F2A Buffalo
Buffalo rapidly got a very bad name in the Pacific. It was overweighed, underpowered, plagued with production defects, and therefore nicknamed the “Flying Coffin”. Even to the utmost skilled pilots, it was barely possible to get a decent performance out of the plane. Although it had some early success, it was not able to withstand its rivals and consequently got a place among the least respected U.S. fighters.
1. Heinkel He-162 Salamander
The He-162 was the Germans’ last-ditch effort to create a cheap and fast jet fighter that could be ready in no time. Made chiefly of wood and hastily taken into service, it was unstable, easily broken, and a nightmare to the pilot. More than 300 Heinkel aircraft were produced; however, more were lost as a result of incidents than in fighting. A lot of pilots who were inadequately trained teenagers made this aircraft as lethal to their team as to the enemy.
These machines show clearly that desire without adequate testing or sound realistic planning most often leads to disasters. In the world of aviation, the sky is a tough judge, and history keeps the record of both the legends and the failures.