75 years ago, Britain was in great peril after being peppered by German bombs. It was only a matter of time, however, before the Crown decided the country had enough. In one valiant stand against the Luftwaffe, the Royal Air Force exacted air superiority over the Nazis in what is now known as the Battle of Britain, proving that air power alone can indeed win a major battle. The soldiers that won the fight? A collection of young-but-raring pilots in the cockpits of their trusted “warbirds,” the Spitfires.
The Spitfire was considered a matchup nightmare for Hitler’s Junkers, Messerschmitt, and Dorniers. It was a short-range, high-performance interceptor aircraft capable of reaching top speeds no other plane in its era could achieve. Flying alongside the trusty Hawker Hurricane, the Spitfire proved to be a menacing foe for the Luftwaffe, which were once thought capable of decimating the RAF in days.
Nowadays, the same planes that quite literally helped “save” Britain from a WW2 German occupation can now be experienced in all their glory via specialised Spitfire flights, offered by firms like Boultbee Flight Academy. Express contributor John Ingham tried flying one himself, and the experience, he says, was one “for a lifetime.”
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