British Aerospace Sea Harrier British Aerospace Sea Harrier The British Aerospace Sea Harrier is a naval short take-off and vertical landing/vertical take-off and landing jet fighter, reconnaissance and attack aircraft; the second member of the Harrier Jump Jet family developed. It first entered service with the Royal Navy in April 1980 as the Sea Harrier FRS1 and became informally known as the ""Shar"". Unusual in an era in which most naval and land-based air superiority fighters were large and supersonic, the principal role of the subsonic Sea Harrier was to provide air defence for Royal Navy task groups centred around the aircraft carriers. The
British Aerospace Sea Harrier time Hawker Siddeley became part of British Aerospace through nationalisation in 1977. By the time the prototype Sea Harrier was flown at Dunsfold on 20 August 1978 the order had been increased to 34. The Sea Harrier was declared operational in 1981 on board the first "Invincible" class ship HMS "Invincible", and further aircraft joined the ageing HMS "Hermes" aircraft carrier later that year. Following their key role in the 1982 Falklands War, several lessons were learned from the aircraft's performance, which led to approval for an upgrade of the fleet to "FRS.2" (later known as "FA2") standard to be