Group Captain Kenneth Gilbert Hubbard was the pilot of an RAF Vickers Valiant bomber which dropped Britain's first live thermonuclear weapon (H-Bomb) in Operation Grapple in the Central Pacific Ocean in May 1957.
Kenneth Hubbard
A mushroom cloud rising over Malden Island after the first British hydrogen bomb test on 15 May 1957
Vickers Valiant B1 XD818, flown by Hubbard during Operation Grapple, now at RAF Museum Cosford
The crewmen's entry door on the side of the forward fuselage of Vickers Valiant B1 XD818, with the names of Hubbard and his crew
The Vickers Valiant was a British high-altitude jet bomber designed to carry nuclear weapons, and in the 1950s and 1960s was part of the Royal Air Force's "V bomber" strategic deterrent force. It was developed by Vickers-Armstrongs in response to Specification B.35/46 issued by the Air Ministry for a nuclear-armed jet-powered bomber. The Valiant was the first of the V bombers to become operational, and was followed by the Handley Page Victor and the Avro Vulcan. The Valiant is the only V bomber to have dropped live nuclear weapons.
First prototype performing a flight display at Farnborough Airshow, 1951
Valiant B(PR)K.1 WZ393 of 90 Squadron in original all-metal finish displaying at Blackpool Squires Gate airport in 1957
Forward view of preserved Vickers Valiant XD818 at RAF Museum Cosford
The wing root and air intakes
