Fairey Seafox

The Fairey Seafox was a British reconnaissance floatplane of the 1930s, designed and built by Fairey for the Fleet Air Arm and meant to be catapulted from the deck of a light cruiser. It was built to Air Ministry Specification S.11/32 for a two-seat spotter-reconnaissance floatplane. The first of two prototypes flew on 27 May 1936 and the first of 64 production aircraft were delivered in 1937, organised as 700 Naval Air Squadron. The fuselage was all-metal monocoque, the wings were metal-covered along the leading edge and fabric elsewhere, and a 16-cylinder 395 horsepower air-cooled Napier Rapier engine gave a cruising speed of 106 mph and a range of 440 miles. Crews found it handled well but criticised it as underpowered, with poor engine cooling and higher landing speeds than wanted. Sixty-six were built in all, two of them finished without floats and used as landplanes, and it served in the Second World War.