Recognition test · Second World War
WW2 Aircraft Recognition Quiz
Ten silhouettes, four answers each. Can you tell a Spitfire from a Bf 109 by its shadow, or a Lancaster from a Halifax as it passes overhead? Every shape is cut from a 3D model of a real airframe and seen from below against the clouds, as an observer on the ground would see it.
Overhead, from below
What is it?
How the quiz works
Each game draws ten of the 37 types below at random. Every aircraft is seen from directly below, as if passing overhead, drawn at a different size and heading against a new sky. Only the plan shape is there to go on: the wings, the engines, the tail. The three wrong answers are taken from the same class where possible, so a single-engined fighter is up against other single-engined fighters and a four-engined bomber against other four-engined aircraft. On a keyboard, the keys 1 to 4 pick an answer.
The silhouettes are drawn from The Hangar, the gazetteer’s collection of 3D models built against three-view drawings and photographs of surviving airframes, most of them aircraft you can visit in a British museum today.
The 37 types in the quiz
Single-engined fighters
- Supermarine Spitfire
- Hawker Hurricane
- Messerschmitt Bf 109
- North American P-51 Mustang
- Republic P-47 Thunderbolt
- Hawker Tempest
- Grumman Martlet (Wildcat)
- Fairey Firefly
Biplanes
- Gloster Gladiator
- Fairey Swordfish
- Supermarine Walrus
- de Havilland Tiger Moth
- Boeing Stearman Kaydet
Trainers and liaison aircraft
Twin-engined
- Messerschmitt Bf 110
- Heinkel He 111
- de Havilland Mosquito
- Bristol Beaufighter
- Bristol Blenheim
- Handley Page Hampden
- Vickers Wellington
- North American B-25 Mitchell
- Douglas Dakota (C-47)
- Airspeed Oxford
Four-engined
- Avro Lancaster
- Handley Page Halifax
- Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress
- Consolidated B-24 Liberator
- Short Sunderland
Jets, rockets and flying bombs
Questions
How does the aircraft recognition quiz work?
You get ten silhouettes, one at a time, each with four possible answers. Pick one and the quiz tells you straight away whether you were right, then moves on. Each game draws ten of the 37 types at random and shows each one from below, at a different size and heading against a new sky, so no two games are the same. It is free, there is nothing to sign up for, and it works on a phone.
Where do the silhouettes come from?
Each silhouette is cut from one of the 3D models in The Hangar, the Aviation Gazetteer’s collection of aircraft models built from three-view drawings and photographs of real airframes. The model is rendered from directly below with every surface solid black, then set against a cloudy sky, small and on a random heading, as an aircraft passing overhead would look.
How were people taught aircraft recognition in the Second World War?
In Britain the job of watching and reporting aircraft overhead fell largely to the Observer Corps, the volunteer body that became the Royal Observer Corps in April 1941. Observers, gunners and aircrew learned types from silhouette charts, solid recognition models and flash cards, and were taught to read an aircraft in a fixed order. A common one was WEFT: wings, engines, fuselage, tail.
How do you tell a Spitfire from a Hurricane or a Bf 109?
From above or below, the Spitfire’s elliptical wing is the giveaway. The Hurricane has a thicker, straight-tapered wing and a deeper, hump-backed fuselage. The Bf 109E has square-cut wingtips, a slimmer nose and a small strut bracing each side of the tailplane. The Mustang’s wing is straight-edged with squared-off tips; the Thunderbolt’s is broad and elliptical.
Can I see these aircraft for real?
Yes. Every type in the quiz is held by at least one museum in the UK. After each answer the quiz links to that type’s page, which lists the museums that have one, with opening times and prices.