Whirlwind: Westland's Enigmatic Fighter

Faster and better armed than the Spitfire, the Whirlwind was the RAF's counter to a new generation of armoured German bombers which it expected to meet in English skies in 1940. A few months after its first flight 1,000 Whirlwinds were ordered, but nine months later the RAF cancelled the entire programme. Just 114 were built, but they went on to have a distinguished three-year career from the uneasy months after the Battle of Britain to their final sorties against Hitler's V-weapons sites i...