Hurricane Mk. I of Pilot Officer Jimmy Dunn

The Hawker Hurricane is one of my favorite WW2 Aircraft. The Spitfire may be more graceful, the FW190 more brutal looking and the P-51 more elegant, but the Hurricane radiates all the characteristics of a true work- and warhorse.

The kit is the Airfix early fabric-wing Hurricane, and as most, if not all, modern Airfix kits, it is easy and fun to assemble. The detailing is quite good, but the plastic is quite soft. Thus, be careful when cutting and sanding. I used decals from several sources: LF Models 'Hawker Hurricane Mk. I. Battle of Belgium" for the roundels markings and Aviaeology's 'Vital Storm pt. 1' for stencils. Seat belts were added from masking tape, and some figures were added from the old Airfix RAF ground crew set. Dunn's Hurricane had the second type of exhausts, and not the original 'kidney' exhaust. It was also equipped with the two-blade Watts wooden propeller. The picture may indicate that Dunn's Hurricane had the early type of radio mast, and not the late type with a short and a long aerial shown on the LF Models instruction sheet.

So, what about the pilot, Pilot Officer Horatio James 'Jimmy' Rennie Dunn? He was awarded his pilot's certificate on December 17, 1938, after successfully passing through the RAF College at Cranwell. He was married to Denise Dunn, neé Foster. Dunn's war was fairly short, and he may have been a bit of an accident-prone pilot. Pilot Officer Dunn flew for No. 87 Squadron, and he was initially based in Lille/Seclin air base in France. On November 10, 1939, Dunn ran out of fuel after having engaged a reconnaissance Dornier over Tourcoing, and being lost, he was forced to land in the Mouscron area in West Flanders, i. e. in neutral Belgium. The Hurricane, L1619, was slightly damaged. Dunn was interned by the Belgian authorities near Antwerp, but he escaped on November 24, 1939, subsequently returning to his base.

Pilot Officer Dunn flew various Hurricanes during the Battle of France, and he claimed one Bf 109 on May 19, 1940. After being evacuated back to Great Britain, Dunn was flying a training flight in a Hurricane nn June 1, 1940. Unfortunately, Dunn failed to recvover from a stalled turn, and he was killed when the aircraft crashed near Yeadon at 12.30. Dunn was only 23 years old.

Source: http://www.henhamhistory.org/DunnWMem.html

Source: www.belgian-wings.be

Hawker Hurricane Mk. IIc of No. 336 (Greek) Squadron

What you see in the store.

The Hawker Hurricane requires little introduction, an it also happens to be one of my favorite WW2 aircraft. This kit was released by Revell Germany in the very early 1990s, and it was also one of the first modern Revell kits with some of the qualities we take for granted today, such as recessed panel lines, detailed wheel wells and cockpit interior. The Revell Hurricane is an easy and enjoyable build, and it comes with markings for No. 336 (Greek) Squadron, as well as a Hurricane based in India towards the end of the war. A more extensive review can be found here. 

No. 336 (Greek) Squadron was part of the armed forces established by the Greek government in exile after the fall of Greece in 1941. Greek pilots were trained in Rhodesia, and they initially manned two squadrons, No. 13 Light Bomber Squadron and No. 335 Fighter Squadron. No. 336 Squadron was added on February 25, 1943. It was initially equipped with 21 Hurricane Mk. IIc aircraft and commanded by Flight Lieutenant Spyridon Diamantopoulos. The ranks included several veteran pilots from No. 335 Squadron, which enabled the Squadron to become operational in a relatively short time: the first combat mision was flown on March 1, and the unit was declared fully operational on April 11. Throughout the summer and early fall of 1943, No. 336 Squadron conducted shipping protection and fighter sweeps. The unit was eventually re-equipped with Spitfire Mk. Vc, with the first Spitfires arriving on October 12. The squadron took part in several raids against Crete in November of 1943, missions that did incur some losses. No. 336 and No. 335 Squadon were subsequently deployed to the Italian theatre, from which they primarily flew support missions over Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. In November 1944 the Greek squadrons returned to liberated parts of Greece, and more specifically the Ellinikon airfield outside Athens. The Greek squadrons flew missions against remaining Axis units in the Aegean and on Crete before being transferred from RAF to Greek control on July 31, 1945. No. 336 Squadron soldiers on to this very day in the Hellenic Air Force, and it is the last unit to fly the A-7 Corsair II.

Hawker Hurricane Mk I flown by Mirosław Ferić

 Mirosław Ferić

The Airfix Hurricane MkI is one of the few models available of the true champion of the Battle of Britain. It does feature raised panel lines and some minor fitting issues, especially when joining the aircraft body to the wings. But taping up the wings to eliminate the gaps and to achieve the correct dihedral solved that. I also added a floor to the cockpit, a gun sight, a late model radio mast, pitot tube, clear plastic position and navigation lights and the auxiliary gun sight as well as the rearview mirror. The decals came from Techmod, and this model represents a Hurricane flown by Miroslaw Feric, a Polish pilot (his father was Croatian, hence the name). He started out his career in a P.11c during the German invasion of Poland in 1939, and his diary formed the basis of the unit history of No. 303 (Polish) Squadron of the RAF. He flew with the Poles that opted to fly for the French before evacuating to England. He was to become the eleventh ranked Polish ace with eight and 2/3 kills and one probable before being killed when his Spitfire broke up above Northolt at an altitude of 3,000 feet in January 1942.