German Fokker gets on to the tail of an Allied RAF SE5 during a First World War dogfight re-enactment at an air display
A dogfight, or dog fight, is an aerial battle between fighter aircraft, conducted at close range. Dogfighting first appeared during World War I, shortly after the invention of the airplane. The Germans acquired an early air superiority due to the invention of the synchronization gear in 1915, transforming air combat with the Fokker , the first synchronized, forward firing fighter the evening of July 1, 1915, the very first aerial engagement by a fighter plane armed with a synchronized, forward-firing machine gun occurred just to the east of Luneville, France. The German Fokker was flown by Lieutenant Kurt Wintgens, earning the victory over a French two-seat observation monoplane. Later that same month, on July 25, 1915, British Royal Flying Corps (RFC) Major Lanoe Hawker, flying a very early production Bristol Scout C., attacked three separate aircraft during a single sortie, shooting down two with a non-synchronizable Lewis gun which was mounted next to his cockpit at an outwards angle to avoid hitting the propeller. He forced the third one down, and was awarded the Victoria Cross. The Royal Aircraft Factory was a British biplane fighter aircraft of the First World War. Although it had a much better overall performance than the Sopwith Camel, problems with its Hispano-Suiza engine meant that there was a chronic shortage of until well into 1918 and fewer squadrons were equipped with the than with the Sopwith fighter. Together with the Camel, the was instrumental in regaining allied air superiority in mid-1917 and maintaining it for the rest of the war, ensuring there was no repetition of "Bloody April" 1917 when losses in the Royal Flying Corps were much heavier than in the Luftstreitkräfte. The Fokker (Dreidecker, "triplane" in German) was a World War I fighter aircraft built by Fokker-Flugzeugwerke. The saw widespread service in the spring of 1918. It became famous as the aircraft in which the 'Red Baron' flew
Size: 6159px × 4080px
Location: Duxford, Cambs, UK
Photo credit: © Avpics / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ..5, 1, 2016, aeroplane, aerospace, air, airborne, aircraft, airplane, airshow, aviation, battle, biplane, britain, cambridgeshire, combat, copyspace, corps, cross, display, dogfight, dogfighting, dr1, dreidecker, england, event, flying, fokker, german, great, iron, kingdom, luftstreitkräfte, luftwaffe, plane, rfc, royal, se5, show, triplane, uk, united, war, world, ww, ww1, wwi
