Flying has fascinated our kind for a very long time. The years that followed the first successful flight of the Wright Brothers saw unprecedented growth in the field. Flyers were revered and every first was celebrated.

Things weren’t too different at the end of World War II. The decade following the war was the British jet age, with the region pioneering in related technology despite just bouncing back from their war efforts. Test pilots were treated akin to today’s celebrities and the sound barrier was just being knocked down. The English Electric Lightning was a British fighter aircraft that broke the sound barrier. 

Petter’s pet project

This aircraft was initially conceived as an interceptor designed to defend airfields housing Britain’s V Force of bombers. The first designs were done by W. E. W ‘Teddy’ Petter and it was capable of Mach 1.5 (1.5 times the speed of sound). Following the submission of the proposal in November 1948, it was provisionally accepted by English Electric and the designation P1 was given in January 1949. 

Work on a more detailed design and a full-fledged mock-up began once the Ministry of Supply granted their approval on March 29, 1949. Just as the pace at which the design developed increased, the target speed too was broadened up to Mach 2. Petter believed that this required a wing sweep of 60° as opposed to the conventional 40° initially planned. 

Stumbling block

The first major hurdle for the project came in December 1949 when Petter resigned as his demands for greater autonomy for his team were not met. It was thus that Freddie Page became the Design Team Leader for the English Electric P1. 

By April the following year, English Electric received an official contract for two flying and one static airframe. Scepticism around Petter’s design, however, meant that the next couple of years were spent testing a large range of tail and wing configurations. This, only to arrive at a conclusion on December 2, 1952, that Petter’s 60° wing sweep configuration was, in fact, the best in terms of effectiveness. 

The English Electric Lightning on display at a RAF Museum. | Photo Credit: Alan Wilson / Wikimedia Commons

From 1953 onwards, the first three prototypes were hand-built at the factory of English Electric at Samlesbury, Lancashire. While WG760 and WG763 were the two flying prototypes, WG765 was the static aircraft. By May 1954, WG760 was relocated to Boscombe Down. Here, the initial prototype underwent its pre-flight ground taxi trials to have it in readiness for its first flight. 

Beamont, the test pilot

Flying it fell upon Roland Beamont, an outstanding flyer and one of the best of his generation. A decorated fighter pilot with the Royal Air Force (RAF), Beamont was appointed as English Electric’s chief test pilot once he left the force following the war. He was the first British aviator to reach the speed of sound in an American P86 in California in 1948 and he was looking forward to breaking the sound barrier on a home-grown aircraft. 

On August 4, 1954, Beamont piloted WG760 for the first time. The initial flights were a success and the craft attained Mach 1 just a week later on only its third flight. Beamont, in fact, had unknowingly breached the sound barrier in his very first flight itself. This was discovered only when the flight data from that first flight was analysed a few days later. A position error of the Machmeter, however, meant that a top speed of Mach 0.95 was only shown during the flight. 

Officially called Lightning

The second group of prototypes, designated P1.B (the three earlier prototypes were reclassified as P1.A), had been in the works during the meantime. The P1.B aircraft (XA847, XA853 and XA856) had some improvements and received the official name “Lightning” in May 1956 to reflect the supersonic capabilities of these aircraft. 

XA847 was one of three prototype P1.B aircraft built and on November 25, 1958 flew faster than Mach 2. The pilot Roland Beamont is seen inset. | Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Beamont made the first flight with XA847 as well, taking the P1.B to a speed in excess of Mach 1 during its first outing on April 4, 1957 itself. In his own words, he then “pushed the envelope further” during further tests, exceeding Mach 2 on November 25, 1958, thereby becoming the first British aircraft to hit that speed. 

Beamont believed that the P1 was one of the best fighter aircraft of its generation in the whole world. He called it “a brilliant thing, a superb aircraft that flew through the sound barrier as if it wasn’t there”.

34-year history

Even after the newly formed British Aircraft Corporation had absorbed English Electric, the Lightning remained in vogue, with improvements and enhancements producing newer generations of the aircraft. In addition to serving the RAF from 1959-88, these were also employed by the Air Forces of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. 

Through its 34-year history, more than 300 aircraft in 16 different variants were built. No longer taking to the skies, a number of these are scattered and preserved throughout the globe, and continue to be among the most loved and instantly recognisable British Fighter aircraft ever built.