The Macchi M.53 was an Italian

reconnaissance In military operations, reconnaissance or scouting is the exploration of an area by military forces to obtain information about enemy forces, terrain, and other activities. Examples of reconnaissance include patrolling by troops (skirmisher ...

floatplane A floatplane is a type of seaplane with one or more slender floats mounted under the fuselage to provide buoyancy. By contrast, a flying boat uses its fuselage for buoyancy. Either type of seaplane may also have landing gear suitable for land, ...

designed and built in the late 1920s by

Macchi Aermacchi was an Italian aircraft manufacturer. Formerly known as Aeronautica Macchi, the company was founded in 1912 by Giulio Macchi at Varese in north-western Lombardy as Nieuport-Macchi, to build Nieuport monoplanes under licence for the Ita ...

for the ''

Regia Marina The ''Regia Marina'' (; ) was the navy of the Kingdom of Italy (''Regno d'Italia'') from 1861 to 1946. In 1946, with the Italian constitutional referendum, 1946, birth of the Italian Republic (''Repubblica Italiana''), the ''Regia Marina'' ch ...

'' (Italian Royal Navy).

Design and development

Macchi designed the M.53 to meet a ''Regia Marina'' requirement for a small reconnaissance

seaplane A seaplane is a powered fixed-wing aircraft capable of takeoff, taking off and water landing, landing (alighting) on water.Gunston, "The Cambridge Aerospace Dictionary", 2009. Seaplanes are usually divided into two categories based on their tec ...

that could operate from the large

submarine A submarine (or sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability. The term is also sometimes used historically or colloquially to refer to remotely op ...

''Ettore Fieramosca''. The aircraft had to be designed so that it could be stowed disassembled in a watertight, cylindrical

hangar A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word ''hangar'' comes from Middle French ''hanghart'' ("enclosure near a house"), of Germanic origin, from Frankish ...

aboard the submarine. In order to minimize danger to the submarine and the aircraft during flight operations—which required ''Ettore Fieramosca'' to loiter on the surface while the aircraft was being assembled or disassembled—the aircraft also had to be designed so that it could be assembled quickly for flight operations and disassembled quickly after recovery for stowage in its hangar. The M.53 was a single-seat low-wing

monoplane A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing confi ...

floatplane with twin floats mounted beneath its

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an engine as well, although in some amphibious aircraft t ...

. Its 60-

kilowatt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James Wa ...

(80-

horsepower Horsepower (hp) is a unit of measurement of power, or the rate at which work is done, usually in reference to the output of engines or motors. There are many different standards and types of horsepower. Two common definitions used today are the ...

) ADC Cirrus II engine drove a two-bladed propeller and gave it a top speed of 144 kilometers per hour (89.5 miles per hour).

Operational history

The M.53 was among various small seaplanes considered for use aboard ''Ettore Fieramosca'', which was commissioned in 1930. None of the aircraft were deployed aboard the submarine, and ''Ettore Fieramosca''s hangar was removed in 1931. Italian submarine ''Ettore Fieramosca''

Operators

; *''

Specifications (M.53)

References

Bibliography