Fighter Interception Unit
Encyclopedia
The Fighter Interception Unit (FIU) was a special interceptor aircraft
Interceptor aircraft
An interceptor aircraft is a type of fighter aircraft designed specifically to prevent missions of enemy aircraft, particularly bombers and reconnaissance aircraft. Interceptors generally rely on high speed and powerful armament in order to complete their mission as quickly as possible and set up...

 unit of the Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 (RAF) during the Second World War. It was part of Air Defence of Great Britain
Air Defence of Great Britain
The Air Defence of Great Britain was a RAF command comprising substantial Army and RAF elements responsible for the air defence of the British Isles...

.

The Fighter Interception Unit was initially set up to evaluate technological advances such as airborne interception (A.I.) equipment (an on-board interception radar) and other operational innovations, to counter increasing night raids by the Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....

.

The unit was formed at RAF Tangmere
RAF Tangmere
RAF Tangmere was a Royal Air Force station famous for its role in the Battle of Britain, located at Tangmere village about 3 miles east of Chichester in West Sussex, England. American RAF pilot Billy Fiske died at Tangmere and was the first American aviator to die during World War II...

 in April 1940 under the command of Squadron Leader
Squadron Leader
Squadron Leader is a commissioned rank in the Royal Air Force and the air forces of many countries which have historical British influence. It is also sometimes used as the English translation of an equivalent rank in countries which have a non-English air force-specific rank structure. In these...

 George Philip (Peter) Chamberlain, with a strength of 5 Blenheims
Bristol Blenheim
The Bristol Blenheim was a British light bomber aircraft designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company that was used extensively in the early days of the Second World War. It was adapted as an interim long-range and night fighter, pending the availability of the Beaufighter...

 equipped with the latest A.I. Mk III radars. Operations initially consisted of daytime practice interceptions and operational night defence flights. The night fighter
Night fighter
A night fighter is a fighter aircraft adapted for use at night or in other times of bad visibility...

 Blenheims were directed several times to possible targets, in the early days of ground-controlled interception
Ground-controlled interception
Ground-controlled interception an air defense tactic whereby one or more radar stations are linked to a command communications centre which guides interceptor aircraft to an airborne target. This tactic was pioneered during World War II by the Royal Air Force with the Luftwaffe to follow closely...

 (GCI) to acquire and then maintain a radar contact, and finally to intercept target proved a very difficult task.

However on the night of the 22/23 July 1940 they achieved the first airborne radar intercepted kill in history. A Blenheim Mk IF flown by Flying Officer G. Ashfield, with a crew of Pilot Officer G.E. Morris (Observer) and Sergeant R.H. Leyland (A.I. operator), patrolled the Sussex coast at 10000 ft (3,048 m). They were directed to a possible intercept by the controller at Poling Chain Home
Chain Home
Chain Home was the codename for the ring of coastal Early Warning radar stations built by the British before and during the Second World War. The system otherwise known as AMES Type 1 consisted of radar fixed on top of a radio tower mast, called a 'station' to provide long-range detection of...

 radar station who reported an incoming raid. Sgt. Leyland reported a response on the A.I. at a range of 8,000 feet and presently P/O Morris made a visual sighting of a Dornier Do 17
Dornier Do 17
The Dornier Do 17, sometimes referred to as the Fliegender Bleistift , was a World War II German light bomber produced by Claudius Dornier's company, Dornier Flugzeugwerke...

 to port and below the Blenheim. Ashfield closed the distance to 400 feet and then opened fire.
Strikes were observed on fuselage and engines, the Dornier lurched to starboard and fell away, 5 miles south of Bognor Regis
Bognor Regis
Bognor Regis is a seaside resort town and civil parish in the Arun district of West Sussex, on the south coast of England. It is south-south-west of London, west of Brighton, and south-east of the city of Chichester. Other nearby towns include Littlehampton east-north-east and Selsey to the...

. The aircraft, a Dornier 17Z of 2 Staffel, Kampfgeschwader 3
Kampfgeschwader 3
Kampfgeschwader 3 "Blitz" was a Luftwaffe bomber wing during World War II .Its units participated on all of the fronts in the European Theatre until it was disbanded in September-October 1944...

, crashed into the sea. The crew was later rescued from the sea. The Blenheim was so close to the Dornier during the attack that the cockpit perspex was covered in oil, resulting in Ashfield losing control and the Blenheim flipping onto its back. He was able to regain control of the Blenheim at an altitude of 700 feet and landed at Tangmere just after midnight.

The unit was later also equipped with the Hawker Hurricane
Hawker Hurricane
The Hawker Hurricane is a British single-seat fighter aircraft that was designed and predominantly built by Hawker Aircraft Ltd for the Royal Air Force...

 and were the first unit to receive the new Bristol Beaufighter
Bristol Beaufighter
The Bristol Type 156 Beaufighter, often referred to as simply the Beau, was a British long-range heavy fighter modification of the Bristol Aeroplane Company's earlier Beaufort torpedo bomber design...

 (on 12 August 1940), still stationed at RAF Tangmere
RAF Tangmere
RAF Tangmere was a Royal Air Force station famous for its role in the Battle of Britain, located at Tangmere village about 3 miles east of Chichester in West Sussex, England. American RAF pilot Billy Fiske died at Tangmere and was the first American aviator to die during World War II...

. Between 1940 and June 1944, some 21 victories were claimed by the FIU.

A FIU detachment was at RAF Newchurch to complement the already formed 150th Wing with the Hawker Tempest
Hawker Tempest
The Hawker Tempest was a British fighter aircraft primarily used by the Royal Air Force in the Second World War. The Tempest was an improved derivative of the Hawker Typhoon, and one of the most powerful fighter aircraft used during the war....

 V, where it tested the AN/APS 13 range-determining radar for night use. This special flight of Tempest V fighters was formed to counter the V-1 "Flying bombs"
V-1 flying bomb
The V-1 flying bomb, also known as the Buzz Bomb or Doodlebug, was an early pulse-jet-powered predecessor of the cruise missile....

 which had begun falling on south-east England. The flight operated mainly by night, and claimed 86 ½ V-1s destroyed before being absorbed into No. 501 Squadron RAF
No. 501 Squadron RAF
No 501 Squadron was the fourteenth of the twenty-one flying units in the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, the volunteer reserve part of the British Royal Air Force. The squadron won seven battle honours, flying Hurricane, Spitfire and Tempest fighter aircraft during World War II, and was one of the most...

. The FIU's Squadron Leader Joseph Berry
Joseph Berry
Joseph Berry was an English first-class cricketer, who played three matches for Yorkshire County Cricket Club over a span of thirteen years from 1861 to 1874. He was a right-handed batsman who scored 82 runs at 10.25 with a best of 30...

 claimed 52 V-1s to become the RAF's top scorer against the flying bombs.

On 23 August 1944 the FIU became the Fighter Interception Development Squadron (FIDS). By the latter war years the unit had become an element of the 'Night Fighter Development Wing' (NFDW) - comprising the 'Bomber Support Development Unit' (BSDU), the FIDS, and the 'Fighter Experimental Flight' (FEF), the latter specialising in day 'Ranger' operations with Mosquitoes
De Havilland Mosquito
The de Havilland DH.98 Mosquito was a British multi-role combat aircraft that served during the Second World War and the postwar era. It was known affectionately as the "Mossie" to its crews and was also nicknamed "The Wooden Wonder"...

. Two Westland Welkin
Westland Welkin
|-See also:-Bibliography:* Buttler, Tony. British Secret Projects: Fighters and Bombers 1935–1950. Hinckley, UK: Midland, 2004. ISBN 1-85780-179-2....

 s served with the Fighter Interception Unit from May to November 1944, where they were used to evaluate suitability for high-altitude fighter operations. A two-seat night fighter version -the Welkin NF Mk II- was also evaluated but only two were produced was not ordered into production.

During the closing months of the war the BSDU claimed four victories, the FIDS two victories, and the FEF eight victories plus a large number of aircraft destroyed on the ground.

In late 1944 a radar-equipped Vickers Wellington
Vickers Wellington
The Vickers Wellington was a British twin-engine, long range medium bomber designed in the mid-1930s at Brooklands in Weybridge, Surrey, by Vickers-Armstrongs' Chief Designer, R. K. Pierson. It was widely used as a night bomber in the early years of the Second World War, before being displaced as a...

 was modified for use by the Fighter Interception Unit as one of the first Airborne Early Warning and Control (AEW&C) aircraft. It operated at an altitude of 4,000 feet over the North Sea to control Mosquito night fighters intercepting Heinkel He 111
Heinkel He 111
The Heinkel He 111 was a German aircraft designed by Siegfried and Walter Günter in the early 1930s in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. Often described as a "Wolf in sheep's clothing", it masqueraded as a transport aircraft, but its purpose was to provide the Luftwaffe with a fast medium...

s flying from Dutch airbases and carrying out airborne launches of the V-1 flying bomb.

Bases

  • RAF Tangmere
    RAF Tangmere
    RAF Tangmere was a Royal Air Force station famous for its role in the Battle of Britain, located at Tangmere village about 3 miles east of Chichester in West Sussex, England. American RAF pilot Billy Fiske died at Tangmere and was the first American aviator to die during World War II...

     18 April 1940 to 20 August 1940
  • RAF Shoreham 20 August 1940 to 1 February 1941
  • RAF Ford 1 February 1941 to 3 April 1944
  • RAF Wittering
    RAF Wittering
    RAF Wittering is a Royal Air Force station within the unitary authority area of Peterborough, Cambridgeshire. Although Stamford in Lincolnshire is the nearest town, the runways of RAF Wittering cross the boundary between Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire....

    3 April 1944 to 23 August 1944
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