The main reward in the Spirit of the Tempest is the first Indian combat aircraft, the HF-24 Marut, designed by Kurt Tank!
HF-24: A Strike Aircraft for Great Britain at Rank V
At a glance:
- High maneuverability
- Up to 4,000 lb of bombs
- SNEB rockets in a retractable pack
- 30 mm cannons!
- Subsonic
- No guided missiles
Vehicle History
In the mid-1950s famous Focke-Wulf designer Kurt Tank, who had previously worked in Argentina, was invited to the position of chief designer at Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) to design the first Indian-made combat aircraft. At the time, HAL engineers already had experience in developing piston-engine training aircraft as well as licensed jet aircraft.
In 1961 after building and testing a wooden glider demonstrator, the first HF-24 prototype was built, receiving the designation Marut (Hindu for “Spirit of the Tempest”). Despite the fact that the aircraft was meant to be an interceptor-fighter capable of reaching speeds of up to Mach 2, issues in selecting a suitable engine led designers to use a pair of Bristol Orpheus MK.703 engines. The combined thrust of these engines barely allowed the aircraft to break the sound barrier, which only ended up being possible at high altitudes.
The first HF-24s were produced in 1964 and despite teething problems, the aircraft made a positive impression on combat pilots. 147 HF-24 Marut aircraft were built, including combat trainer variants. In combat, the Marut was typically used as a strike aircraft, leading it to receive an increased payload during modernization. The last Marut was withdrawn from service in the mid-80s.
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Introducing the HF-24 Marut!
Meet the main reward in the Spirit of the Tempest event that started today: India’s first domestically designed combat aircraft, the HAL HF-24 Marut! This is a subsonic strike aircraft with good acceleration, excellent controllability and strong weaponry. Let’s dive in!
The HF-24 is a twin-engine aircraft that features swept wings and a fairly long fuselage. Using a pair of Bristol Orpheus MK.703 engines, the HF-24 is unable to break the sound barrier in most instances, with the exception of using minimum fuel with no suspended weapons at a high altitude. Despite this, the HF-24 has a very high rate of climb for its rank, and can be easily controlled throughout the entire speed range — even with a maximum load of fuel and suspended ordnance. The HF-24 can also withstand significant overloads, which is very useful during dive attacks.
Let’s take a closer look at the available set of weapons for this aircraft. For guns, the HF-24 is equipped with four 30 mm ADEN cannons, which are very familiar if you’ve played the British aircraft tree. These guns have a high rate of fire, overheat slowly and come with a decent ammo capacity of 520 shells. Among the available options is an armor-piercing belt, great for destroying lightly armored vehicles and being a menace to medium tanks.
At the front of the HF-24 is a retractable bay that contains 50 small SNEB rockets. One of these rockets alone is unlikely to cause serious damage, but if you fire in salvos, there’s a chance they will be able to take out a well-protected ground vehicle. And by the way — the same rockets can be taken on underwing hardpoints in blocks of 18. There’s another type of rocket available as well — 16 of the larger T10 151, familiar if you’ve played the French aircraft tree. The icing on the cake are four Nasser 240 rockets, the Egyptian version of well-known high-caliber S-24 from the USSR.
Interesting: The HF-24 Marut model was created for the game by War Thunder player Vitaly “NovA29” Vostokov — certainly a familiar name by now. From the players, for the players!
What kind of strike aircraft would it be without any bombs? The HF-24 has access to four underwing weapon hardpoints that can accommodate regular 500 to 1000 lb bombs, as well as 1,000 lb drag bombs. This is great, however the HF-24 has no guided weapons at all, either for air or ground combat. This means you’ll have to attack the old-fashioned way and win air battles with ye olde 30 mm ADEN cannons.
That’s it for this one! The Spirit of the Tempest aircraft event started today, so don’t miss the chance to obtain this famous-first Indian combat aircraft.
Please note that this vehicle’s characteristics may be changed before it is added to the game.
Click here to find out more details about the Spirit of the Tempest event
