Parasite aircraft

The first parasite aircraft flew in 1916, when the British launched a Bristol Scout from a Felixstowe Porte Baby flying boat.

In 1915 Neville Usborne and another British officer worked on a plan to lift a BE.2C fighter under an SS-class non-rigid airship.

After that, this squadron, based in the Crimea, carried out a tactical attack on a bridge over the river Dnieper at Zaporozhye, which had been captured by advancing German troops.

[8] Later in World War II, the Luftwaffe experimented with the Messerschmitt Me 328 as a parasite fighter, but problems with its pulsejet engines could not be overcome.

By contrast, the Empire of Japan was able to get the Yokosuka MXY7 Ohka kamikaze rocket plane type into active service, typically using the Mitsubishi G4M (Betty) bomber class to carry them within range.

However, their effectiveness proved minimal in part because Allied air naval defense took advantage of the weight of the parasitical aircraft payload slowing the carrying bombers, making them vulnerable to interception before the rocket plane could launch.

These projects were all soon abandoned, partly because aerial refueling appeared as a much safer solution to extend the range of fighters.

As of 2014[update], DARPA was working on a project to launch and recover unmanned aerial vehicles from larger aircraft.

[9] Examples that have flown include: In the 1957 Jet Pilot movie, featuring John Wayne, parasite fighters are an important part of the plot.

The 1989 movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, a Bücker Bü 131 Jungmann biplane is stolen by Indy and his father to escape the zeppelin.