English Electric Canberra

The English Electric Canberra is a British first-generation, jet-powered medium bomber developed by English Electric from the mid to late 1940s in response to a 1944 Air Ministry requirement for a successor to the wartime de Havilland Mosquito fast bomber. The requirement asked for outstanding high-altitude bombing capability and high speed, which the design met partly by using newly developed jet propulsion. The first prototype, VN799, made its maiden flight on 13 May 1949, and the type entered Royal Air Force service in May 1951 as the service's first jet-powered bomber. In February 1951 a Canberra became the first jet aircraft to make a nonstop transatlantic flight, and in 1957 one set a world altitude record of 70,310 feet. Adaptable in service, it flew as a tactical bomber and as a photographic and electronic reconnaissance aircraft, and it was licence-built in Australia and, as the B-57 Canberra, in the United States. Global production totalled 1,352 aircraft, and the RAF retired its last three in June 2006.