Hawker Sea Fury in Action

The Hawker Sea Fury belongs to a select group of piston-cngined fighter aircraft whose general performance reflected the ultimate from this form of fighter aircraft power plant.
It is an irony that the Royal Navy became the primary operator of the aircraft, since it was originally designed for the Royal Air Force as part of the succession of fighter air­craft from Hawker that started with the Fury biplane and included the Hurricane, Typhoon and Tempest.
During 1942, Hawker, at the request of the Air Ministry, began work on a long-range fighter for operations in the Far East. When Japan had struck British possessions in the Far East in December of 1941. the only fighters in the area were short-ranged defensive fighters. The distinct possibility of having to drive the Japanese thousands of miles back to their homeland meant that fighter escorts for Allied bomber forces would be faced with the need to fiv prolonged distances over water to strike at enemy targets.