The Short Sturgeon was a planned British carrier-borne reconnaissance bomber whose development began during Second World War with the S.6/43 requirement for a high-performance torpedo bomber, which was later refined into the S.11/43 requirement which was won by the Sturgeon. With the end of the war in the Pacific production of the aircraft carriers from which the Sturgeon was intended to operate was suspended and the original reconnaissance bomber specification was cancelled. The Sturgeon was then redesigned as a target tug which saw service with the fleet for a number of years. Later, the basic Sturgeon design was reworked as a prototype anti-submarine aircraft. The many modifications that resulted turned the promising design into a "hapless and grotesque-looking hybrid." The development process leading to the S.38 Sturgeon began with the 1943 S.6/43 requirement for a high-performance torpedo bomber with a bomb bay that could accommodate six 500-pound (230 kg) bombs or any of the current standard aerial torpedoes, operating from Audacious and Centaur-class aircraft carriers. A maximum all-up-weight of 24,000 lb (11,000 kg) was specified. Short Brothers were not invited to respond to S.6/43, but the preliminary responses from the other participating manufacturers indicated that a twin-engined design meeting all requirements was likely to weigh in excess of 24,000 lbs, while a single-engined design was unlikely to exceed the performance of in-service aircraft. S.6/43 was allowed to proceed, and there are indications that Shorts submitted two uninvited tenders, a single-engined Bristol Centaurus design and a twin-Rolls-Royce Merlin design. However, none of the original S.6/43 submissions was adopted and no reference to the Shorts submissions has been located in the official documentation. Focus instead shifted to splitting the requirements, with the torpedo bomber requirement becoming O.5/43, eventually leading to the Fairey Spearfish, while S.11/43 was written for a reconnaissance aircraft able to operate as a bomber. Specification S.11/43 called for the design and construction of a twin-engine naval reconnaissance aircraft for visual and photographic reconnaissance and shadowing, by day or night, and also able to operate as a bomber. The specification included a maximum all-up weight of 24,000 lb, height (stowed) of 17 ft (5.2 m), length of 45 ft (13.7 m) and a wingspan of 60 ft (18.3 m) (spread) / 20 ft (6.1 m) (folded). Powered wing-folding was also required. Shorts submitted the twin-Merlin S.38 Sturgeon as their tender to S.11/43, while Armstrong Whitworth proposed the twin-Merlin powered AW.54. After the AW.54 was criticized for lack of power, the AW.54A with two MetroVick F.3 turbojets was submitted. Submissions were also made by Blackburn and Fairey (also with twin-Merlin designs) and by Westland with a mixed-power design comprising a Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major radial in the nose and a Halford H.1 turbojet in the tail. On 19 October 1943, Shorts received the "Instruction to Proceed" and an order for three prototypes designated Sturgeon S.1, with military serials RK787, RK791 and RK794 assigned. The final tailored S.11/43 requirements followed in February 1944. The pilot's cockpit was a sub-assembly bolted to the front of the spar, placing him level with the leading edge of the wing, the navigator was behind the centre section of the wing and the radio operator — separated from the navigator by his equipment — behind him. The navigator and radio operator entered through a door, which acted as a ladder when opened, in the starboard side with their seats being offset to port. The cameras were installed in the fuselage behind the radio operator. One of the Sturgeon's unfortunate failings was in placement of controls. The fire extinguisher switch was located next to the cockpit switches required for firing the engine starter cartridges, resulting in some inadvertent mishaps and some unintended hilarity for ground crews. For more information on design and development, operational history, and variants, click here.
