Gloster Meteor F.4 (Mk.IV) Britannia - Speed Record
Gloster Meteor F.3 (Mk.III) fighter EE454, modified on the production line to the new F.4 (Mk.IV) version at Manston Airfield, ready to attempt the world air speed record. The Rolls-Royce Derwent Mk.I turbojet engines were replaced with Derwent Mk.V turbojets which produced 3, 500 pounds of thrust each. The wings were shortened, the tips reshaped and the canopy cut down. The aircraft were lightened and all armaments were removed, surfaces smoothed and painted in a gloss finish. EE454 (pictured here) retained the standard camouflage and was named aBritannia'. On 7th November 1945, Group Captain Hugh Joseph Wilson, CBE, AFC, Royal Air Force, Commandant of the Empire Test Pilots School, Cranfield, set the first world speed record with a jet-propelled airplane, and the first speed record by an aircraft in excess of 600 miles per hour (965.6 km per hour), piloting Britannia to 975.68 km per hour (606.36 miles per hour) at an altitude of 250 feet (76.2 meters) over a course from the Herne Bay Pier to Reculver Point, along the south coast of the Thames Estuary
