Hawker Siddeley Harrier Hawker Siddeley Harrier The Hawker Siddeley Harrier, developed in the 1960s, is the first of the Harrier Jump Jet series of aircraft. It was the first operational close-support and reconnaissance fighter aircraft with vertical/short takeoff and landing (V/STOL) capabilities and the only truly successful V/STOL design of the many that arose in that era. The Harrier was developed directly from the Hawker Siddeley Kestrel prototype aircraft, following the cancellation of a more advanced supersonic aircraft, the Hawker Siddeley P.1154. The British Royal Air Force (RAF) ordered the Harrier GR.1 and GR.3 variants in the late 1960s. It was exported to
Aircraft in fiction for the Decepticon Jetblade. A prototype Harrier was used in the TV series "The Saint" (1962–1969) in Season 5, Episode 13 "Flight Plan" (aired June 25, 1967). In the show Simon Templar has to retrieve a prototype aircraft called the "Osprey" that was stolen by its test pilot and flown to a middle eastern country. The "Osprey" is portrayed by a Hawker Siddeley P.1127 and a Hawker Siddeley Kestrel, both early versions of the Harrier. A Royal Air Force Harrier was used by MI6 in the 1987 James Bond film "The Living Daylights" to smuggle KGB defector Georgi Koskov out