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Fairey Gannet
Links, References & Credits

[History] [Survivors & Leading Particulars] [Pictures] [Links, References & Credits] 

This page last updated on Saturday 16th May 2009

Links

• Steve Metcalf's Fairey Gannet group is mostly dedicated to photos of XA459.
• William Daysh's 49ers Reunion Web Site, for RN Aircraft Artificers, includes a good number of piccies of Gannets in action in the galleries.
• 4+ aircraft monographs - Gannet bonus section includes some photos that didn't make it into their publication on the Gannet (see below).
• Fleet Air Arm Association of Australia - Fairey Gannet.
• Paul Nann's excellent picture collection includes several Gannets.
• Fairey Gannet wikipedia entry.
• Breguet Alize & Fairey Gannet from Greg Goebel.
• Prime Portal has a number of walkarounds of different Gannets: AS.4, AEW.3, AEW.3 again, AEW.3 again! and ECM.6.
• Grubby Fingers has an AS.1 walkaround and some colour profiles.
• Hyperscale has this ECM.6 walkaround plus this one.
• Ventura Publications has this AS.1, AEW.3 and T.5 walkaround.

Books

• Gannet From The Cockpit by Simon Askins, published by Ad Hoc Publications; ISBN 978-0-946958-63-4. In common with other books in this series, this is a weighty softback biased towards large photos interspersed with stories from those who flew the type, and brief development and service history sections. Each squadron gets brief coverage with a selection of photos and colour profiles. Some of the photos you will have seen in other Gannet books - but at least these familiar faces are reproduced well, and often in page-filling size! The only criticism I could offer is that the layout is a bit chaotic, with stories and photos appearing in somewhat random fashion (certainly no chronological ordering). In general though an excellent volume and thoroughly recommended. [Buy from Ad Hoc]

• Submarine Hunter by Ben Patynowski, published by Mushroom Model Publications; ISBN 8389450577. A strange one, this. Basically a book full of reminiscences from RAN veterans who worked on or flew in Gannets (plus several who did not - quite why they are in the book I don't know), with lots and lots of photos fairly evenly split between shots of Gannets and shots of people (often as they are now rather than when they were in the RAN), plus a selection of colour profile drawings. Many of the stories told are duplicated; many of the anecdotes clearly need editing, and come across as 'copy and paste' jobs from emails or letters. As a collection of memories for the ex-RAN personnel involved to enjoy, it's a great book. As a general reference on the Gannet, it's pretty weak - the photo selection is excellent but most are reproduced quite small; the colour profiles are nicely done but exhibit various minor errors (and one big one, on every single profile - compare the exhaust location with photos!). Given the publisher's name you'd expect it to be more aimed at modellers than any other market, but there's really nothing in here other than the photos and profiles to help modellers - no detail shots, no plans, no colour scheme details or histories, etc. Finally, and most oddly, for a book titled 'Submarine Hunter' there is is absolutely nothing on the tactics or procedures involved in this particular task - it is just a collection of relatively shallow anecdotes. Accidents and problems obviously stand out clearly in people's memories so the accounts are weighted towards that sort of story. Hard to recommend as a reference work - however, if you were in the RAN at the time, definitely worth a read, and as a collection of photos of RAN Gannets in a single publication it cannot be beaten. The book is also somewhat expensive - the price from Amazon makes it a much more reasonable proposition. [Buy from Amazon UK]

• Fairey Gannet - Anti-submarine and Strike variants AS Mk.1, AS Mk.4 by Martin Velek, Michal Ovc(ác(ík, Karel Susa, published by 4+; ISBN 978-80-86637-04-4. Absolutely superb monograph for modellers - a detailed history, loads of photos (mostly monochrome), accurate 1/72 scale plans and lots of colour profiles. Good coverage of German and Australian Gannets as well as British ones. Highly recommended. [Buy from Ian Allan]

• Warpaint No. 23 - Fairey Gannet by Steve Hazell, published by Hall Park Books Ltd.; ISSN 1361-0369. Up to the usual standard of Warpaint volumes, with good history and selection of photos (worth getting for these alone), scale plans (but you can't really rely on them - several errors evident) and basic colour profiles (watch out for the errors in these too - use photos as reference). Out of print but can be had second hand. [Buy from Amazon UK]

• Gannet by Brian Fiddler; published by Picton Publishing (Chippenham) Ltd.; ISBN 0 948251 46 8. Brief development and service history, but mostly this book is dedicated to listing the squadrons that operated the Gannet (including RAAN and Indonesian examples), with lots of monochrome pictures. Finishes with many annotated pictures of the cockpit, closeup pictures, scale plans and profile drawings for modellers. Worth getting hold of.

Magazines

• AIR Pictorial May 1970: The Fairey Gannet by Elfan ap Rees - 5 page article covering development & service history with a good selection of small monochrome pictures.
• AIR Pictorial February 1977: Gannet's Nest by Alan B. Carlaw - a look at the Gannets of 894 NAS at Lossiemouth
• FlyPast April 1997: Gannet U.S.A. - article on XT752's return to the air with some superb pictures.
• Scale Aircraft Modelling July 1986 (Vol 8 No 10): Aircraft In Detail - Fairey Gannet - excellent article on the Gannet's development and service history with lots of monochrome pictures and lots of profile drawings. Well worth seeking out.
• Scale Aircraft Modelling September 1991 (Vol 13 No 12): Inside Story - Fairey Gannet AEW.3 - detail pictures of Newark's XP226 (which also makes up many of the pictures in the detail galleries here), including cockpit shots.

Credits

This section would have been greatly the poorer without contributions from the following - so many thanks to (in alphabetical order):

Alan Allen, Gary Barker, Richard Bell, Mick Boulanger, Paul Burton, Dick Clements (RIP), David Copley, Howard Curtis, Ray Deacon, Marco Dijkshoorn, John Eacott, Darryl Gibbs, Martin Herbert, Richard Jones, Garry Lakin, Bob Lawson, Andy Lewis, Kieran Maher, Andy Marden, Steve Metcalf, Glen Moreman, Richard Nels, Gary Parsons, Marco Pennings, Craig A. Schiller, Paul Seymour, Martin Standaert and Christop Westhaus.

Thanks also to the following organisations:

Australian Museum of Flight, Gatwick Aviation Museum, Imperial Aviation (Sandtoft) Ltd., Midland Air Museum and Newark Air Museum.

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