There's a very good chance you've heard of Britain's famous fighter aircraft that defended the skies of Britain, preventing Nazi invasion during the Second World War. But, have you heard of one of the key weapons that helped to make them quite so successful? Join Jonathan for a deep dive into the 20mm Hispano autocannon.

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See Spitfires take to the skies from the airfield where they first flew. Visit IWM Duxford: https://bit.ly/visitduxford and see Jonathan Ferguson talking about more British aircraft mounted weapons here:    • Why did Spitfires change their guns? ...  

A massive thanks to IWM for allowing us to use some of their archival materials. Delve into their archives here: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections

0:00 Introduction
0:38 Cannon?
2:40 IWM Spitfire
5:35 Historical Context
8:20 Ammo and Magazines
13:45 Firing Process
23:10 Evolution
25:05 Outro

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