Short Brothers
In the 1960s, Shorts mainly produced turboprop airliners, major components for aerospace primary manufacturers, and missiles for the British Armed Forces.
The quality of their work impressed Colonel James Templer, superintendent of the Royal Balloon Factory, who introduced the brothers to Charles Rolls.
In 1910 the Royal Aero Club and Short Brothers moved to a larger and less marshy ground at Eastchurch, about 2.5 miles (4 km) away.
[10] In 2013 a statue of the brothers was unveiled in memory of their contribution to early aviation, by local artist Barbara Street to stand on the site of the Aero Club clubhouse at Muswell manor.
Flying from HMS Ben-my-Chree, piloted by Flight Commander Charles Edmonds, it hit a Turkish supply ship in the Dardanelles.
[11] In terms of number built, the S.184 was Shorts' most successful pre-Second World War aircraft: over 900 were produced, many under licence by other manufacturers.
[12] During the First World War, Shorts were among the manufacturers of two flying boats, the F.3 and F.5, designed by John Porte at the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe.
[13] Due to the company's success, and the increasing number of seaplanes being produced, larger premises with ready access to the sea were needed.
[14] In 1913, an 8.4 acre (3.4 hectare) plot of land by the river Medway about 20 miles (32 km) away at Borstal,[14] near Rochester, Kent, was purchased from Charles Willis (a local councillor), and the planning and construction work started.
A long concrete slipway was constructed from the centre-line of No.3 Erecting Shop to enable aircraft of up to 20 tons weight to be launched even at low tide.
As part of the contract, a loan was provided to enable the company to purchase a site near Cardington, Bedfordshire, on which to build airship construction facilities.
Shorts survived without reducing the company's workforce by diversifying into areas such as building lightweight bus and tram bodies.
[17] During the 1920s and 1930s, flying boats were favoured for long-range civil aviation, because their operation did not rely on the existence of suitable airfields, which were not widespread at the time.
Shorts designed the floats used for the Supermarine S.4 and Gloster III seaplanes entered by the United Kingdom for the 1925 Schneider Trophy race.
Two de Havilland Giant Moths were fitted with Shorts floats at Rochester, and the first was flown in June 1928; both were delivered to Western Canada Airlines Ltd.
By April 1929 two more had been added to the fleet, and they operated passenger-preferred coastal routes from Genoa to Alexandria by way of Athens, Corfu, Naples, and Rome.
A year later Shorts won a British government defence contract for the Sunderland military patrol flying boat.
On 5 July 1937, a Short Empire was used by Imperial Airways for the first westbound transatlantic service from Foynes, Ireland to Newfoundland.
Tasman Empire Airways Limited (TEAL) operated the Coral Route from New Zealand to Fiji, the Cook Islands and Tahiti in the South Pacific, with Short Solent flying boats up to 1960.
[20] A temporary Short's factory was established at White Cross Bay, Windermere,[21] that produced 35 Sunderland Mark IIIs.
[22] During the Second World War, the Short Sunderland was an effective anti-submarine patrol bomber operated by RAF Coastal Command in the Battle of the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, in Asia and the south Pacific because of its availability, endurance and weapon load.
In the absence of sufficient Sunderlands, Australia impressed Qantas-Imperial Short Empire flying boats into military service, and used these successfully especially on reconnaissance missions in the Timor Sea area.
In 1944, the Short Shetland, a high-speed, long-range, four-engined flying-boat, was built (with Saunders-Roe providing the wings and detail design work), but the project was abandoned shortly after the end of the war, however conversions and developments of the Sunderland entered service as transports, starting during the war with the Hythe, which was a demilitarized Sunderland with the turrets faired over, then the post-war Sandringham, which refined the shape to eliminate the turret mountings, and finally by the definitive Solent, with an enlarged tail and more powerful engines and other refinements derived from the stillborn wartime Seaford, which was to have been the penultimate Sunderland development.
[26] As early as 1953, Shorts became involved with pioneering the development of electronic analogue computers, to assist with the design of increasingly complex aircraft.
The Skyvan is most remembered for its box-like, slab-sided appearance and rectangular twin tail units, but the aircraft was well loved for its performance and loading.
It served almost the same performance niche as the de Havilland Twin Otter, and the Skyvan proved more popular in the freighter market due to the large rear cargo door that allowed it to handle bulky loads with ease.
[31] In April 1989, three Northern Irish men, Noel Little, Samuel Quinn and James King, were arrested in Paris and later convicted of "arms trafficking and associating with criminals involved in terrorist activities.
[38] In 1993, with the company under the chairmanship of Sir Roy McNulty, Bombardier Shorts and Thomson-CSF formed a joint venture, Shorts Missile Systems, for the design and development of very short-range, air defence missiles for the UK Ministry of Defence and armed forces worldwide using expertise dating back to the 1950s.
In 2000, Thomson-CSF bought Bombardier's 50% share to become the sole owner of Shorts Missile Systems, renaming it Thales Air Defence in 2001.
