| Barry, 18.11.2015 17:33 When the English Electric Company was formed from several electric companies, one of their number, the Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Company, brought with it two prototype flying boats known as the P4 Cork. The designer W.O.Manning led a design team and under spec.23 /23 redesigned the P4 to become the P5 Kingston, five of which were ordered.
The prototype was built at Preston and taken to the Ribble Estuary for it's first flight where, after a general inspection, it went to take off and promptly disappeared in a shower of spray and sunk. All the crew escaped. Subsequently, it was found that the aircraft had hit some flotsam and had been holed. Subsequent models were equally poorly performing for various reasons and with the last model the Kingston III being tested at the MAEE at Felixstowe and thoughts being given to featuring an all metal hull it was all too late as English Electric
had closed it's aircraft manufacturing department not to open again until 1944. It is strange to think that they would go on to design such aircraft as the Canberra and the Lightning !
Engines 2 x Napier Lion III 12 cylinder each developing 450 h.p.
Span 85'6" Length 52'9" Height 20'11" Max take off weight 14,508 lb reply |
