Original version

BBC World Service Australasia

The Forum

Documentaries

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Discover world history, culture and ideas with today’s leading experts

BBC World Service Online

BBC World Service schedule for American satellite radio and the Caribbean

BBC World Service Americas and the Caribbean

BBC World Service

BBC World Service Europe and the Middle East

BBC World Service South Asia

BBC World Service East Asia

BBC World Service East and Southern Africa Schedule

BBC World Service East and Southern Africa

BBC World Service West and Central Africa Schedule

BBC World Service West and Central Africa

The Forum: The Jet Engine

Discussion & Talk

1920x1080close up of jet engine. Credit: Getty/Dushlik

22/09/2018 GMT

The Jet Engine

BBC World Service - The Forum, The Jet Engine

The trailblazing technology which made the air age soar

Quentin Cooper and guests follow the history of the jet engine from its origins to the 1960s.

Quentin Cooper and guests follow the twists and turns of jet engine development: from its 1930s origins and the often highly dangerous early fighters in World War 2, through Korea, Vietnam and the Cold War, to the much more reliable modern incarnations which now take us all over the world. 
Just three decades after the first airplane took off, the emerging aero industry was already stalling.  There were limits to how big propeller-driven aircraft could get.  How fast they could go.  And how far.  For the air age to truly take off it needed a new kind of propulsion: the jet engine.  
With Professor of the History of Industry and Technology at Rutgers University Philip Scranton; historian Hermione Giffard, author of Making Jet Engines in World War II;  and former head of the Aircraft Collection at the Deutsches Museum in Munich Walter Rathjen.

Photo: close-up of a jet engine. (Getty Images/Dushlik)

Accessibility links

Programme Index

The Forum

The Jet Engine

Genres

Formats

Brand

BBC World Service Australasia

About BBC World Service