The Nieuport-Macchi Parasol was a single-engine observation aircraft produced by the Italian aeronautical company Nieuport-Macchi in the early 1910s. It was the first aircraft designed independently by Macchi, which until then had only produced aircraft under license.[1] The Parasol operated in front-line service in 1915 during the early stages of Italy's participation in World War I.
Development history
The Nieuport-Macchi company was established in 1912 as a licensed manufacturer of aircraft built by the French Nieuport company.[2] Its main product was the Nieuport IV, a two-seater monoplane sold for both civil and military use. As in other monoplanes, the Nieuport IV′s wing obstructed the downward view of the pilot and any observer, so to solve that problem in a new aircraft, Nieuport-Macchi designers placed the wing above the fuselage following the so-called "sun visor" scheme, or as it was known in France at the time, the "parasol wing" design, hence the new aircraft's name, Nieuport-Macchi Parasol. Nieuport-Macchi derived other construction details of the Parasol from the Nieuport IV already in production:[1] Mainly of wood construction covered by canvas, the Parasol had an 80-horsepower (60 kW) Gnome 7 Lambda seven-cylinderair-cooledrotary engine driving a helical wooden two-bladed fixed-pitch propeller. It had bicycle landing gear with a rear skid. As in similar monoplanes of the era, the Parasol had no ailerons and instead used wing warping to control roll. The Parasol made its first successful flight in 1913, and mass production followed.
Operational history
Taking off from the airfield at Mirafiori with test pilotClemente Maggiora at the controls, a Parasol set the Italian height record for an aircraft with two people on board in December 1914, reaching an altitude of 2,700 metres (8,858 ft).
With Italy's entry into World War I looming, the Royal Italian Army was looking for new equipment, and Nieuport-Macchi proposed the Parasol for use by the army′s Servizio Aeronautico Militare ("Military Aviation Service"), which on 7 January 1915 became the Corpo Aeronautico Militare ("Military Aviation Corps"). The army judged the Parasol robust and easy to dismantle, so it approved construction of the aircraft and ordered enough Parasols to equip two artillery-spottingsquadrons.[1]
On 24 September 1915, a second Parasol squadron, the 3rd Artillery Squadron, was formed, equipped with four Parasols.[5]
Although the Parasol′s parasol wing gave its crew better downward visibility than in other monoplanes, allowing for good photographic shots, the plane was not very stable and was difficult to fly, so much so that many accidents occurred.[1] The high accident rate, together with the impossibility of the Parasol reaching sufficient altitude to escape the fire of anti-aircraft guns, prompted the retirement of the Parasol from service in November 1915.[4]
