Short Type 320

The Short Type 320, also known as the Short Admiralty Type 320, was a British two-seat reconnaissance, bombing and torpedo-carrying folder seaplane of the First World War. It was designed to carry a Mark IX torpedo, was larger than the Short 184 and had two-bay uneven span wings. The two prototypes used a 310 hp Sunbeam Cossack engine and were first called the Short 310 Type A, and the production aircraft took the name Type 320 from its 320 hp Cossack. The first prototype was ready in July 1916 and was rushed to the Adriatic. A total of 127 were built with orders at Shorts and at Sunbeam. Royal Naval Air Service examples reached Italy in 1917, but fuselage collapses after torpedo release delayed operations, a raid on 2 September 1917 failed in heavy seas, and the type appears never to have launched a torpedo in action. It served on as a reconnaissance seaplane until the end of the war.