Voisin III

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Voisin III

Type	Biplane
Manufacturer	Aeroplanes Voisin (Gabriel Voisin)
Designed by	Aeroplanes Voisin (Gabriel Voisin)
Maiden flight	1914
Retired	before 1918
Status	Decommissioned
Primary users	French Air Force Allies of World War I
Number built	over 800
Developed from	Voisin I

The Voisin III (or Voisin 3) was one of the first two-seat bomber and ground attack aircraft of World War I. It was a pusher biplane, developed by Aeroplanes Voisin of Gabriel Voisin in 1914 as a more powerful version of the 1912 Voisin I (Voisin 1) design.

The Voisin III became the standard Allied bomber in the early years of the war. The main users were the French Air Force and the Imperial Russian Air Force. Russia ordered over 800 in France and built a further 400 under license. Around 100 were built in Italy, and 50 in the United Kingdom, while smaller numbers were purchased by Belgium and Romania.

The first Voisin III was powered by a single 120-horsepower Salmson M9 engine, later the 150hp P9 and R9. It had a range of 200 km, top speed of 105–113km/h and ceiling of 3350m–6000m (sources vary).

First armaments often included a machine gun (Hotchkiss M1914 machine gun) on the fuselage operated by a standing observer, later models had 37mm or 47mm guns for ground attack. It could carry up to 55kg, 60kg or 150kg of bombs (sources vary).

Escadrille of Voisin's III, First World War.

The Voisin pusher series performed a variety of missions, including reconnaissance, artillery spotting, training, day and night bombing, and ground attack.

On October 5, 1914 Sgt Joseph Frantz and Cpl Louis Quenault of Escadrille VB24 scored the first air-to-air kill of the war, shooting down a German Aviatik B.II with machine gun fire from their Voisin III over Jonchery, Reims. This is believed to be the first air-to-air kill in any war.^[1]

The Voisin III is also notable in being one of the first dedicated bombers. French bomber units equipped with Voisin III staged a retaliatory attack against the Badische Anilin Gesellschaft at Ludwigshafen, Germany, on May 26, 1915, shortly after the German Army introduced poison gas in battle. Successful daytime attacks on targets within Germany ensued, but by 1916 advances in design meant that Voisin III became increasingly vulnerable to new, better performing, German fighter aircrafts; it was soon withdrawn from day operations, and successfully replaced by newer models. In the Voisin series it was succeeded by Voisin V (Voisin 5).

[edit] References

^ Francisco Javier Guisández Gómez (1998-06-30). "The Law of Air Warfare". International Review of the Red Cross (323). Retrieved on 2006-12-16. Cited to the Enciclopedia de aviación y astronáutica, Ediciones Garriga, 1972, Vol. I, p. 1079.