2002 Hurricane Flying Colours, 10-cards, Rockwell Publishing, UK

2002 “Hurricane Flying Colours”
Rockwell Publishing, 10-cards, UK

Series Title: Hurricane Flying Colours
Manufactured by: Rockwell Publishing
Country of Origin: England, UK
Card Type: Commercial
Number of Cards: 10
Numbering: 1 to 10
Card Dimensions: 62.2 × 80.0 mm (measured)
Circa: 2002
Checklist: Download

2002 “Hurricane Flying Colours” Overview

The Hawker “Hurricane” is a British single-seat fighter aircraft that was designed and predominantly built by Hawker Aircraft Ltd. for the Royal Air Force (RAF). Although largely overshadowed by the Supermarine “Spitfire”, the aircraft became renowned during the Battle of Britain, accounting for 60% of the RAF’s air victories in the battle, and served in all the major theaters of the Second World War. During the 1940 “Battle of Britain” the Hurricane was used primarily to attack Luftwaffe bomber formations. The faster Supermarine Spitfire was relegated the task of confronting the Luftwaffe’s fighter aircraft. The crews of the Hawker “Hurricanes” and Supermarine “Spitfires” were the focus of Winston Churchill’s iconic “Never was so much owed by so many to so few” speech on 20 August 1940.

The Hawker “Hurricane’s” 1930s design evolved through several versions and adaptations, resulting in a series of aircraft which acted as interceptor-fighters, fighter-bombers (also called “Hurribombers”), and ground support aircraft. Further versions known as the “Sea Hurricane” had modifications which enabled operation from ships. Some were converted as catapult-launched convoy escorts, known as “Hurricats”. More than 14,000 Hawker “Hurricanes” were built by the end of 1944. This including at least 800 converted to “Sea Hurricanes” and some 1,400 built in Canada by Canadian Car and Foundry.

This 2002 series of ten “Hurricane Flying Colours” airplane trading cards was issued by Rockwell Publishing, England, UK. The card fronts feature several Hurricane variants shown with their WWII operational squadron “Flying Colours”. The attractive “Hurricane” artwork, printed on white card stock, is centered within a thin black rectangular borderline with ample external margins. The upper left hand corner of the card image area denotes the card’s manufacturer “Rockwell Cards” in gold lettering. The title of the card, and the name of the series, is printed in black ink on the lower right-hand corner of the card’s image area. The Backs of the cards are printed in a light blue ink on white card stock. The card Backs includes the set title, card number, card title, a brief descriptive text, and advertising copy all superimposed over a light blue monotone image of the subject aircraft. The card dimensions are 36.0 × 67.3 mm. To the best of our knowledge, there is no wrapper or album associated with this set. During 2002, Rockwell Publishing issued two different card size versions of this “Hurricane Flying Colors”: (1) The small 36.0 × 67.3 mm 10-card set, and (2) the medium sized 62.2 × 80.0 mm 10-card set. Both sets shared the identical artwork and checklists.

2002 “Hurricane Flying Colours” Image Guide

Behind each of the “thumbnail” images below is a 600-dpi computer enhanced image of the individual card fronts and Backs. Directly below the image guide, in a tabular format, are the links to the original 600-dpi scans that were used to generate the computer enhanced images.

2002 “Hurricane Flying Colours” Rockwell Publishing, England, United Kingdom, 10 Airplane Cards ORIGINAL SCANS
1 1b	2 2b	3 3b	4 4b	5 5b	6 6b	7 7b	8 8b	9 9b	10 10b

Series Checklist

We have included two versions of checklist: (1) the web version shown below, and (2) an Adobe^® Acrobat^® PDF 8½ × 11 inch format checklist. click on the “PDF” icon to download the checklist.

2002 “Hurricane Flying Colours” Rockwell Publishing, England, United Kingdom CHECKLIST
№	x	Card Front Title
1		Hurricane I (L1555)
2		Hurricane V7476
3		Hurricane IIC (HL603)
4		Hurricane IID (BP188)
5		Hurricane I (L1990)
6		Hurricane X (BW850)
7		Hurricane IIB (BD930)
8		Hurricane I (V6611)
9		Hurricane IIB (Z3768)
10		Zmaj built Hurricane I

Contributors

John Shupek — John is retired Aeronautical/Aerospace Engineer that lives in Southern California. John’s 36 year aerospace career/adventure started in the mid-1960s when he worked for Pratt & Whitney at their “FRDC” … Florida Research and Development Center, West Palm Beach, Florida. John was part of the P&W jet engine design team for the CIA/USAF’s Lockheed A-12/SR-71A “Oxcart/Blackbird” engines (J58/JT11D-20). He also worked on the RL-10 rocket engine and the JTF-17A which was P&W’s entry into the United States’ SST competition between Boeing and Lockheed. Several years later, John moved back to California and worked at the AiResearch Mfg. Company at LAX and Torrance. He originally worked on the thermal design of the HRE (Hypersonic Ramjet Engine) which was a supersonic combustion Mach 7 ramjet engine that was to be tested on the North American X-15. John did about three more years of jet engine design work before he disappeared for 13 years into the classified DOE “GCEP” (Gas Centrifuge Enrichment Plant) Atomic Energy program for the enrichment of U₂₃₅. After the GCEP program was cancelled by the DOE in 1985, John was hired by Northrop Aircraft to do the thermal design for Northrop’s entry into the ATF (Advanced Tactical Fighter) competition, the Northrop YF-23A “Black Widow II” stealth supercruise fighter. He also worked on the Northrop Grumman B-2A “Spirit” stealth bomber. After several years on a classified stealth missile program, John worked the remainder of his Aerospace career as one of Northrop Grumman’s Program Directors on the United States Navy’s F/A-18E/F “Super Hornet” jet fighter program.

During John’s career at Northrop Grumman he served for five years as Northrop’s “Vintage Aircraft Club” Commissioner and the Curator and Webmaster for the Western Museum of Flight in Hawthorne, California. Several years later, John was the volunteer webmaster (for about 3 years) for the Yanks Air Museum, Chino, California. He also served as President and webmaster for two different NPOs after his retirement. The Whittier Historical Society & Museum and Whittier Meals on Wheels.

John’s love of aviation history and aviation photography lead to the establishment of this Skytamer.com website in 1998. The Skytamer.com site has continued to expand and will always grow and will never be completed. It’s sort of analogous to a snowball rolling down a hill without any trees to stop it. In approximately 2002, John remembered that he had collected Topps “Wings” (ACC# R707-4) airplane trading cards while in High School. Somehow the cards had disappeared over the years. So at this point, he started to re-collect airplane trading cards via eBay and become an airplane card “Image Collector” rather than a “Card Collector” per se. After John scans an airplane card for the website, he has no further use for it and he puts it back into circulation via eBay. John’s mission statement for the Skytamer.com is basically to restore and preserve high-quality card images/artwork associated with the various airplane card sets from the early 1900s to the present. These cards are wonderful historical “snapshots” into aviation history showing which aviation events and aircraft were important at that point in time. For the Skytamer.com website, basically if it is a trading card collection that features things that fly, but doesn’t have feathers, it is eligible for consideration on the Skytamer.com website. John always welcomes inputs and high resolution scans (600-dpi) that can be used on this website. John can be reached via the “Contact Us” navigation button on the left.

References

Shupek, John. 600-dpi card scans from the Skytamer Images “Skytamer Archive”