Vickers Wellington - Britain's Workhorse

This is a reupload of the original video.
The Vickers Wellington was the main British bomber in the first half of the Second World War. It was also the most produced of all the British bombers in the conflict. Join us for a look at this emblematic aircraft.

0:04 History
6:03 Variants
8:05 Head to Head
9:51 Notable Pilots
11:25 Conclusion

Disclaimer - This channel is apolitical. We do not endorse any kind of political view.

Game footage and aircraft models

Corrections
- Nothing yet.

Music by order of appearance

History:
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Variants:
Sacred Garden by Guilherme Bernardes from Pixabay

Head to head:
Lone Wolf by Guilherme Bernardes from Pixabay

Notable Pilots
and
- Royal New Zealand Air Force March Past

Conclusion
- Ride of the Valkyries by Wagner | Youtube Audio Library

SFX
Old Vintage Film Scratches:

Sources

- Vickers Wellington Units of Bomber Command - Michael Napier - ISBN 1-4728-4075-2
- British Warplanes of World War II - Daniel J. March - ISBN 1-84013-391-0
- Aircraft of World War II - Chris Grant - ISBN 1-84013-336-8
- Fighting Aircraft of World War II - Bill Gunston - ISBN 1-84065-092-3
- Jane's Fighting Aircraft of World War II - ISBN 1-85170-493-0
- Wikipedia

I do not own any of the images used in this video. The owners of such images are identified in the video itself.

[slick_slicers]

My grandfather, W/Cdr David Holford DSO, DFC, flew two full tours in Wellingtons. Unfortunately, on his 3rd tour as C/O of 100Sdr he crashed his Lancaster on returning from Berlin. He remains the youngest W/Cdr in the RAF, ever.

[paulharding]

My father trained in and operated as a bomb aimer/navigator on Wellingtons towards the end of the war. Service in the Middle East. We have his flight log and boots. So proud.

[nicholasconder]

My father was a navigator in Wellingtons in the Western Desert. He told me a couple of interesting facts about the plane. First, if you stood at the front of the plane and looked back to the rear turret, you could actually see the fuselage corkscrew while the plane was in flight. Second, if the plane was losing altitude, you could reduce the weight of the plane by cutting parts of the geodetic fuselage structure at specifically marked places on the girders. Third, the plane was designed in part by Barnes Wallis, famous creator of the bomb used by the Dam Busters raid. The fuselage structure was based on the geodetic girder structure he created for the British airship R100.

[brianworth]

My father was a Wellington tail gunner in the gold coast, Africa, doing submarine patrols in the Atlantic. They had quite a high attrition rate, mostly through poor maintenance. In fact it got so bad, that just before take-off, the captain would pick a ground crew guy at random to go along for the ride. The quality of maintenance improved somewhat after that.

[ffcfesta]

My Grandfather was a Tail Gunner in Wellington Mk1c's with 115 Squadron from Jan-Jun 1941. That tour covered 16 missions before his tour was brought to end following a bail out in the sea on returning from a raid on Hamburg. Seven crews from 115 at RAF Marham were lost during that 5 1/2 months. He was awarded a DFC for shooting down an Me110 on return from bombing Brest Harbour whilst just north of Morlaix in North Western France.

[bigblue]

The principle designer was Barns Wallis. And his design saved his life. He was in a Wellington which was doing a night flight along the south bank of the River Humber when it flew into the cable from a barrage balloon. The cable started to saw its way through the bombers wing when it hit the spar which attached the wings to the body of the aircraft. A part of the design which Wallis was responsible for. Because of the strength of the spare rather then the wing being sawn-off the spare actually snapped the cable allowing the Wellington to fly on and land at an airfield, saving the lives of all on board.

[AllthingsWW]

Hey there,
This is a reupload of the original video. I'm sorry for that.
It's the first time I had to take down a video and I hope the last. I'm very sorry for all those who lost their comments and had Youtube recommend the same content for the second time.


For those that want to know what happened:

The original video had a bad mistake on the Notable Pilots section, where I stated: "(...) first of only three New Zealanders to have received the Victoria Cross (...)". This is of course untrue. I changed it to what it was supposed to be "(...) first of only three New Zealand airmen to have received the Victoria Cross (...)". The third picture and name were also wrong, and I replaced it with the correct one: Lloyd Trigg.

Thank you all for watching, and a special thanks to all the New Zealanders for their patience, I know there is plenty of you watching my videos. 👍

[Malibu]

One of my teachers in junior high school flew Wellingtons during WWII. He was amazed that I knew that the Wellington's nic name was Wimpy.
Thanks Airfix

[shannon]

Designed by Barnes Wallace. The airframes would flying because the geodetic design would maintain its strength after damage.
I watched some of these take off from Northolt airfield in 1939.

[Zags]

My Grandfather was a Wellington Pilot, a Squadron Leader in #69 Sqd 2 TAF. Flew it operationally until the final day of the war. Night reconnaissance and tactical bombing. Thanks for the great video.

[grahamo]

If you want to see a nearly intact Wellington, go to the Brooklands Air museum. The canvas covering is gone, but everything else is there. The aircraft was found by accident in Loch ness during a sonar search for Nessie. The crew had bailed out at low altitude in freezing fog thinking they were going to hit the mountains on their return journey, but the aircraft flat landed on the lake - and you can see all the props still in place but bent back by the water landing. And you can walk through the airframe - truly amazing. Its been restored brilliantly by volunteers.

[michaelleblanc]

Love the 'Wimpy. My father, as a bowser crewman serviced the aircrew from 1940 through to 1945 with 425 Sqdn in England, North Africa and back in England again changing to the Halifax III. He left a great diary behind . . . and left me with understanding and admiration for them all.

[kurtzwar]

Note the Polish RAF squadron at 4:43 in the video (red and white checkered insignia). In the Battle of Britain, Polish RAF pilots had a German plane kill rate that was twice as high as the rest of the RAF. The Polish 303 squadron is famous for its skill and courage. The Poles were first to fight and provided major help for the allies in WW2. The Polish forces in Italy took Monte Casino and opened the door to Europe from the south. Polish tank squadrons battered German tanks in Northern Europe after D-Day. Poland is for heroes. We treated Poles poorly after the war. To our shame.

[nigeldewallens]

I had two uncles that worked on the wellingtons! One was a navigator and lost his life in his first raid! the other survived and went on to fly them down in the Med and he told me how when you flew low, you would see the ships crew running about on the deck and then he had to pull it up to go over the ship he was attacking! What was interesting about this story was this! We were on our boat at the time and as dear Uncle Alf was telling me this an R.A.F twin engined plane was flying at eye level towards us on the flying bridge and it too had to raise its self up to miss us! It really gave me chills at the time! R.I.P Uncle Alf and Uncle Victor an uncle I never knew! Thank you for that interesting info on the Wellington! I loved it!

[johnholt]

Very very reliable and much tougher than its German contemporaries. The fact it stayed in front line till 1945 speaks volumes.

[downwindchecklist]

Thx for posting. I am currently building a model Wellington on my channel and it is nice to see that this fantastic piece of engineering has not been forgotten!

[MrRugbylane]

I have come to love my War Thunder Wellington. The geodesic construction under the skin is beautifully rendered

[Bruce-]

My mother's cousin, William Forrester, flew Wellingtons 172 squadron Coastal Command. He did not return from operations, April 1943 #wewillremember.

[brentsummers]

In one book I read it said Barnes Wallis was having trouble getting a Wellington bomber allocated to his test program for the bouncing bombs. A snooty official at the Air Ministry wanted to know why Wallis had the nerve to ask for such a valuable aircraft for an experimental program. Once Wallis explained that he was the designer of the Wellington things went a lot better!

[Peter-lmic]

I believe one weakness of the Wellington was it’s vulnerability to flank attacks not having a dorsal turret. When the plane was designed flank attacks were not usually performed . A dorsal turret was fitted on a trial basis but much reduced the speed and performance of the aircraft and was not proceeded with.