Airspeed Horsa

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airspeed_Horsa

The Airspeed AS.51 Horsa was a British troop-carrying glider used during the
Second World War. It was developed and manufactured by Airspeed Limited,
alongside various subcontractors; the type was named after Horsa, the legendary
5th-century conqueror of southern Britain.

Having been greatly impressed by the effective use of airborne operations by
Nazi Germany during the early stages of the Second World War, such as during the
Battle of France, the Allied powers sought to establish capable counterpart
forces of their own. The British War Office, determining that the role of
gliders would be an essential component of such airborne forces, proceeded to
examine available options. An evaluation of the General Aircraft Hotspur found
it to lack the necessary size, thus Specification X.26/40 was issued. It was
from this specification that Airspeed Limited designed the Horsa, a large glider
capable of accommodating up to 30 fully equipped paratroopers, which was
designated as the AS 51.

The Horsa was inducted in large numbers by the British Army Air Corps and the
Royal Air Force (RAF); both services used it to conduct various air assault
operations through the conflict. The type was used to perform an unsuccessful
attack on the German Heavy Water Plant at Rjukan in Norway, known as Operation
Freshman, and during the invasion of Sicily, known as Operation Husky. Large
numbers of Horsa were subsequently used during the opening stages of the Battle
of Normandy, being used in the British Operation Tonga and American operations.
It was also deployed in quantity during Operation Dragoon, Operation Market
Garden, and Operation Varsity. Further use of the Horsa was made by various
other armed forces, including the United States Army Air Forces.

In the early stages of the Second World War, the German military demonstrated
its role as a pioneer in the deployment of airborne operations. These forces had
conducted several successful operations during the Battle of France in 1940,
including the use of glider-borne troops during the Battle of Fort Eben-Emael.
Having been impressed by the performance and capabilities of German airborne
operations, the Allied governments decided that they would form their own
airborne formations as well. As a result of this decision, the creation of two
British airborne divisions came about, as well as a number of smaller-scale
units. On 22 June 1940, the British airborne establishment was formally
initiated when the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, directed the War Office in
a memorandum to investigate the possibility of creating a corps of 5,000
parachute troops. During 1941, the United States also embarked on a similar
programme.

While the equipment for the airborne forces was under development, it was
decided by War Office officials that gliders would be an integral component of
such a force. It was initially thought that gliders would be used to deliver
paratroops. Transport aircraft would both carry paratroops and tow a glider with
a second party of troops. The idea arose as a response to the severe shortage of
transport aircraft in the early part of the war, as in this way the number of
troops that could be dropped in an operation by a given number of transport
aircraft would be greatly enhanced. The empty gliders would be towed back to
base.

However, thinking eventually evolved into using gliders to land both troops and
heavy equipment in the theatre of operations. The first glider to be designed
and produced was the General Aircraft Hotspur, the first prototype of which flew
on 5 November 1940. However, it was soon determined that there were several
problems with the Hotspur's design, the principal of these being that the glider
was incapable of carrying sufficient troops. Tactically, it was believed that
airborne troops should be landed in groups far larger than the maximum of eight
fully equipped paratroopers that the Hotspur could transport, and also that the
number of aircraft required to tow the gliders needed to carry larger groups
would be impractical. There were also concerns that the gliders would have to be
towed in tandem if used operationally, which would be extremely difficult during
nighttime and through cloud formations.

Accordingly, it was decided that the Hotspur would be used only as a training
glider. while British industry continued with the development of several
different glider designs, including a larger 25-seater assault glider, which
would become the Airspeed Horsa. On 12 October 1940, Specification X.26/40 was
issued, calling for a large assault glider. Amongst the requirements given on
the specification was that the aircraft should make use of wood construction
where possible in order to conserve critical supplies of metal. Airspeed was
amongst those aviation companies to receive Specification X.26/40; The Horsa,
which was later given the designation of AS 51, would be developed out of the
company's efforts to meet these requirements.

Airspeed assembled a design team, headed by aircraft designer Hessell Tiltman.
Tiltman's design efforts were initially carried out at the de Havilland
technical school at Hatfield, Hertfordshire, before relocating to Salisbury
Hall, London Colney. Initially, it was planned that the Horsa would have been
used to transport paratroopers, who would jump from doors installed on either
side of the fuselage, while remaining under tow throughout; under this concept,
the use of the type for actual landings would have been a secondary role. The
widely set doors enabled simultaneous egress to be conducted, as well as for
troops on board to fire upon nearby hostiles from within the glider; for the
latter purpose, they were also provisioned with several purpose-built firing
points located in the roof and tail. However, the idea was soon dropped, and it
was decided to simply have the glider land airborne troops.


Role
Troop and cargo military glider

National origin
United Kingdom

Manufacturer
Airspeed Ltd

First flight
12 September 1941

Introduction
1941

Primary users
Army Air Corps
United States Army Air Forces,
Royal Canadian Air Force,
Indian Air Force

Number built
over 3,600

The Horsa was first deployed operationally on the night of 19/20 November 1942
in the unsuccessful attack on the German Heavy Water Plant at Rjukan in Norway
(Operation Freshman). The two Horsa gliders, each carrying 15 sappers, and one
of the Halifax tug aircraft crashed in Norway due to bad weather. All 23
survivors from the glider crashes were executed on the orders of Adolf Hitler,
in a flagrant breach of the Geneva Convention which protects prisoners of war
(POWs) from summary execution.

In preparation for further operational deployment, 30 Horsa gliders were
air-towed by Halifax bombers from bases in Great Britain to North Africa; three
of these aircraft were lost in transit. On 10 July 1943, the 27 surviving Horsas
were used during Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily, which was the
type's first large-scale operation.

The Horsa was deployed in large numbers (estimated to be in excess of 250)
during Battle of Normandy; specifically in the British Operation Tonga and
American operations. The first unit to land in France during the Battle of
Normandy was a coup-de-main force, carried by six Horsas, that captured Pegasus
Bridge in Operation Deadstick over the Caen canal and a further bridge over the
River Orne. During the opening phase of the operation, 320 Horsas were used to
perform the first lift, while a further 296 Horsas participated in the second
lift. Large numbers of both American and British forces were deployed using the
Horsa during the opening phase of the battle.

The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) acquired approximately 400 Horsas in a
form of reverse Lend-Lease.Capable of accommodating up to 30 troop seats, the
Horsa was much bigger than the 13-troop American Waco CG-4A (known as the
Hadrian by the British), and thus offered greater carrying capacity.

In British service, the Horsa was a major component during several major
offensives that followed the successful Normandy landings, such as Operation
Dragoon and Operation Market Garden, both in 1944, and Operation Varsity during
March 1945. The latter was the final operation for the Horsa, and had involved a
force of 440 gliders carrying soldiers of the 6th Airborne Division across the
Rhine.

Operationally, the Horsa was towed by various aircraft: four-engined heavy
bombers displaced from operational service such as the Short Stirling and
Handley Page Halifax, the Armstrong Whitworth Albemarle and Armstrong Whitworth
Whitley twin-engined bombers, as well as the US Douglas C-47 Skytrain/Dakota
(not as often due to the weight of the glider,. In Operation Market Garden,
however, a total of 1,336 C-47s along with 340 Stirlings were employed to tow
1,205 gliders,) and Curtiss C-46 Commando. The gliders were towed with a harness
that attached to points on both wings and also carried an intercom between tug
and glider. The glider pilots were usually from the Glider Pilot Regiment, part
of the Army Air Corps (AAC), although Royal Air Force (RAF) pilots were used on
occasion.

Specifications (AS 51)

General characteristics
Crew: 2
Capacity: 25 troops (20–25 troops was the "standard" load)
Length: 67 ft 0 in (20.43 m)
Wingspan: 88 ft 0 in (26.83 m)
Height: 19 ft 6 in (5.95 m)
Wing area: 1,104 ft² (102.6 m²)
Empty weight: 8,370 lb (3,804 kg)
Loaded weight: 15,500 lb (7,045 kg)

Performance
Maximum speed: 150 mph on tow; 100 mph gliding (242 km/h / 160 km/h)
Wing loading: 14.0 lb/ft² (68.7 kg/m²)




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