The Buccaneer is a British carrier-capable attack aircraft designed in the 1950s for the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom. Designed and initially produced by Blackburn Aircraft at Brough, it was later officially known as the Hawker Siddeley Buccaneer when Blackburn became a part of the Hawker Siddeley Group. The Buccaneer was a two crew, two engined jet that would fly fast at low altitudes to attack enemy ships. First flight was April 1958 and after development problems, not unusual in those years with a new jet, the first S1 version entered service in 1963 with the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm. They were also flown from aircraft carriers. The only export customer was South Africa in the 1960s that used about 16 jets from land bases that flew them till 1991.
After the cancellation of the TSR.2 program the Buccaneer S.2 was also used by the Royal Air Force from 1969 from land bases (and also some FAA Buccaneers were transferred to the RAF). They flew until 1994 with the RAF. Some 211 Buccaneers were produced.
Buccaneer S.1
This Buccaneer S.1, serial XN957 was manufactured in 1963 and flew until 1971. It is on display at the Fleet Air Arm Museum, RNAS Yeovilton (U.K). It had the code "630" and is almost fitted as manufactured.
Photographed May 2023 by Henk de Jong (C), Copyright IPMS Nederland
Buccaneer S.1
This Buccaneer S.1, serial XN964, was built by Blackburn at Brough in 1963 and delivered to the Royal Navy in the same year. It operated from aircraft carrier HMS Victorious and later fromLossiemouth. In the 1970s it was used at RAF Bedford. It is from 1988 on display at the Newark Air museum (U.K). It has the code "630".
Photographed November 2023 by Meindert de Vreeze (C), Copyright IPMS Nederland
Quite some plastic scale model kits exist of the Buccaneer.
In 1/72: there was the old Frog kit and the old Airfix mk.1 NA39 kit. Matchbox came with an RAF kit in 1974 also released by Revell. In 1989 a better 1/72 Airfix S.2 kit appeared. A good but expensive resin kit was released by CMK in 2006 of several versions. A brand new S.2 kit came in 2019 from Airfix.
In 1/48: Airfix came with a few kits in 2022.
In 1/100 Tamiya / Revell CEJI had a kit and in 1/144 Welsh had a kit as well as 144th.co.UK.
In 1/32 it appears there was a very rare Aerodynamix resin kit in 1995
This walk around page was first published on April 2024 by M. de Vreeze; note the Copyright!