Have you ever seen a Flying Boat as big as this!?

The Short Sunderland is a massive four engine piston patrol aircraft that varied massively from the more modern Avro Shackleton, Hawker Siddeley Nimrod and Boeing Poseidon aircraft in that it’s a maritime patrol aircraft that can actually take-off and land on water.

Developed from the civilian Short Empire flying boat, the Sunderland replaced the Short Sarafand, first flew in 1937 and entered service with the Royal Air Force in 1938. Given the aircraft was mostly operated over the sea, I do wonder why it wasn’t flown by the Royal Navy.

The Sunderland featured a number of offensive and defensive armaments such as machine gun positions in the nose, tail and on the upper side of the fuselage and it could carry depth charges, aerial mines and bombs.

Powered by four Bristol Pegasus radial engines, the Sunderland had a maximum speed of around 180 knots, a service ceiling of 17,000 feet and a range of around 1,550 nautical miles. It was also fitted with detection equipment such as radar and a powerful searchlight.

The type saw extensive service in the Battle of the Atlantic and a Canadian Sunderland was credited with making the first U-Boat kill in July 1940. The aircraft was to become such a menace to German U-boats, that the Kriegsmarine started fitting 37mm and 20mm flak guns to their submarines, to help protect them from aerial attack.

You can see in this video how the bombs and depth charges could be reloaded via the hatch in the side of the fuselage. The bombs could be run in and out of the fuselage on racks and there was space for 4 bombs on each rack. Once depleted the crew had to replace them before the pilot started their next bombing run.

The nose turret could be slid rearwards in order to anchor the aircraft to a floating buoy. Apparently marine life such as barnacles on the aircraft’s hull could become such as problem, that fully-loaded, the aircraft might struggle to get airborne.

Following the end of the war, the Sunderland was used extensively during the Berlin Airlift and in the Korean War. The type would be retired from service with the Royal Air Force in 1959 but would continue to be operated by the Royal New Zealand Air Force until as late as 1967. Between 1938 – 1946 over 700 Sunderlands were built.