Armstrong Whitworth Apollo Armstrong Whitworth Apollo The Armstrong Whitworth AW.55 Apollo was a 1940s British four-engine turboprop airliner built by Armstrong Whitworth at Baginton. The aircraft was in competition with the Vickers Viscount but was beset with engine problems and only two were built. The requirement resulted from the Brabazon Committee's Type II design, calling for a small, medium-range pressurized aircraft to fly its less-travelled routes which became Air Ministry Specification C.16/46 for an aircraft able to carry 24-30 passengers over 1,000 mi (1,610 km) at a cruising speed of . The resulting design was the AW.55 Apollo, a low-wing cantilever monoplane with
Vickers V-1000 on the overall project. Construction of the prototype was performed at Vickers' facility at Wisley Airfield, Surrey; flight trials would have also been based there. By November 1956, over £4 million had been spent on the V-1000 project; the first prototype had also reached 80 per cent completion. It had been estimated that the VC7 would have been in operational service as early as 1959, the same year in which the first V-1000s were projected to be delivered to the RAF. If it had entered commercial service as envisioned, it would have been the first turbofan-equipped airliner to serve long-haul