Sopwith Cuckoo

The Sopwith Cuckoo was a British single‑seat torpedo bomber developed during the First World War by the Sopwith Aviation Company. First flown in November 1917, it entered limited service with the Royal Naval Air Service in 1918, where it became the first aircraft specifically designed to launch torpedoes from aircraft carriers. Its compact biplane layout featured a 200‑hp Hispano‑Suiza V‑8 engine, a wingspan of 34 ft (10.4 m) and a rugged steel‑tube fuselage that could withstand the shock of carrying a 1,000‑lb (454‑kg) torpedo beneath the centreline. The crew sat in an open cockpit beneath the upper wing, and the aircraft’s elimination of external bracing wires reduced drag, giving it a top speed of about 115 mph (185 km/h). Though only 117 were built before the armistice, the Cuckoo demonstrated the practicality of ship‑borne air attack and influenced later carrier‑borne designs such as the Fairey Swordfish. Its operational trials aboard HMS Furious and HMS Argus proved that a torpedo could be released reliably at low altitude, shaping naval aviation strategy for the interwar period and beyond. It also served as a testbed for carrier landing techniques that became standard in the Royal Navy’s air arm.

Sopwith Aviation Company

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