Hawker Hurricane Mk.IIc, LF363 - RAF Battle of Britain Memorial Flight

The Royal Air Force Battle of Britain Memorial Flight's (BBMF) Hawker Hurricane Mk.II, LF363, flown by Squadron Leader Mark Sugden, completes three flypasts at The Shuttleworth Collection's Old Warden Airfield on 12 May 2024, to open the Shuttleworth Best of British Season Premiere Airshow 2024.

As part of its last ‘Major’ service at Biggin Hill, which was completed in Spring 2022, LF363 was repainted into new colours as ‘RF-J’ of 303 Kościuszko (Polish) Squadron during the Battle of Britain.

The original Hurricane ‘RF-J’, which LF363 now represents, was Hurricane Mk. I, V6665, which was delivered as a replacement aircraft, to 303 Squadron at Northolt on 7th September 1940. It lasted for only 20 days before it too was lost in combat.

In common with all the 303 Squadron Hurricanes, V6665 was painted with the colourful circular unit badge on each side of the upper fuselage under the wireless aerial mast. In addition, shortly after receiving instructions from Headquarters 11 Group on 16th September, V6665 was painted with an unusual red diagonal band around the rear fuselage ahead of the fin and tail. This was an experimental identification marking that was applied to three of 303 Squadron’s Hurricanes as a trial, which was later not pursued. It was not, as some think, an indication that this was a flight commander’s aircraft.

Hurricane V6665 was flown on its first operational sortie on 9th September 1940 by Flight Lieutenant Johnny Kent, a Canadian RAF pilot who was one of the RAF flight commanders on the unit. During this sortie, Kent damaged a Junkers Ju 88 twin-engine bomber and shot down a
Messerschmitt Bf 110, which crashed into the waters of the English Channel and exploded, with no sign of survivors from its crew.

Hurricane V6665 flew 19 operational sorties during its short life with 303 Squadron, 11 of these with Johnny Kent as the pilot. In total, V6665’s pilots claimed four enemy aircraft destroyed while flying her. Polish pilot Sergeant Michal Brzezowski claimed two Heinkel He 111's in V6665. He was killed on 11th September when he was shot down, while flying another Hurricane. Sergeant Tadeusz Andruszkow destroyed a Dornier
Do-17 while flying V6665 on 26th September, but he was shot down and killed while flying her on the following day. He was only 19 years old and is buried in Northwood Cemetery, Middlesex. Hurricane V6665 crashed near Cowden, Kent, and was destroyed.

303 Squadron is now accepted as being the highest scoring RAF fighter squadron of the Battle of Britain, with the best kill to loss ratio of all RAF units involved in the battle, despite being in the front line for only 42 days.

In its new markings Hurricane LF363 commemorates Group Captain Johnny Kent DFC and Bar, AFC, Virtuti Militari, whose final total of wartime victories was 13 enemy aircraft destroyed, and also the vital part that the Polish Air Force played in defending freedom during the Second World War and during the Battle of Britain in particular.

Filmed at The Shuttleworth Best of British Airshow 2024.

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