Fairey Firefly

The Fairey Firefly was a Second World War carrier-borne fighter and later anti-submarine aircraft, flown principally by the Fleet Air Arm. It was developed from two Air Ministry specifications of 1938 for new naval fighters and built as a two-seat fleet reconnaissance fighter with the pilot and observer at separate stations. The first prototype flew on 22 December 1941. Faster and better armed than the Fulmar it replaced, it entered service only near the end of the war and was then adapted for strike and anti-submarine work, serving in the Korean War and with the navies of Australia, Canada, India and the Netherlands, whose Fireflies were still flying sorties against Indonesian infiltrators in 1962.