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The HMS Eagle was a British aircraft carrier launched in 1918 and constructed from the hull of a battleship cancelled in 1914. When
the Second World War started, the HMS Eagle was totally obsolete, but she still operated in China, in the Indian Ocean, in the South
Atlantic and in the Mediterranean, where she had started service in 1924. The HMS Eagle usually served as escort for convoys and
also in offensive actions against the enemy convoys, naval units and bases. At the start of 1942 the HMS Eagle had enhanced
antiaircraft artillery and a radar installed. While operating in the Mediterranean in August 1942, she was sunk near Tunisia,
in barely four minutes, by four torpedoes launched by the German submarine U-73.
The illustration shows the HMS Eagle as she was in February 1942, with a Swordfish torpedo bomber in the cross-shaped fore elevator.
It can be seen the elongate bridge with two funnels and tripod mast, the 102-millimeters antiaircraft cannons in the flight deck and
the 152-millimeter cannons in the forecastle deck. The specifications below correspond to 1942.
Class: Eagle (1 unit - Eagle)
Type: Aircraft carrier
Length: 203.5 meters
Beam: 32 meters
Draught: 8.1 meters
Displacement (standard): 22960 tonnes
Propulsion: 4 x shaft, 4 x steam turbine Parsons, 32 x boiler Yarrow, 52100 horsepower
Speed: 24.3 knots (45 kilometers/hour)
Range: 3000 nautical miles (5556 kilometers) at 17.4 knots
Fuel: 2860 tonnes of petrol
Complement: 950
Armament: 9 x 152-millimeter 50-caliber cannon, 4 x 102-millimeter 45-caliber cannon, 16 x 40-millimeter cannon,
12 x 20-millimeter cannon, 4 x 7.7-millimeter machine gun
Armor: 25-114 millimeters in belt, 25 millimeters in flight deck, 38 millimeters in upper deck/main deck
Aircraft: 21
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