Dassault Mirage IIIV

Dassault Aviation · France · first flew 1965 · fighter

The Mirage IIIV was a French VTOL fighter prototype that added a battery of lift jets to a Mirage III delta-wing airframe in an attempt to combine vertical takeoff with supersonic performance.

Recognition (WEFT)

W — Wings	Mid-mounted, delta
E — Engines	9 × turbojet, fuselage-mounted
F — Fuselage	deepened fuselage spine housing eight lift jets plus the main cruise engine (nine engines total)
T — Tail	Conventional

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Spot it by:

delta wing typical of the Mirage III family
deepened fuselage spine housing eight lift jets plus the main cruise engine (nine engines total)
enlarged, bulged fuselage compared with a standard Mirage III

A Mirage III delta-wing silhouette with a noticeably deepened fuselage spine housing the lift-jet installation, distinguishing it from a standard Mirage III.

Specifications

The Dassault Mirage IIIV has a length of 18 m (59 ft).
It has a wingspan of 8.72 m (29 ft).
Typical crew: 1.

Figures are for the representative variant described above; marks differ. See how AircraftIQ sources figures.

History

First flown in 1965, it used eight small lift jets buried in the fuselage alongside its main cruise engine to achieve vertical takeoff, reaching Mach 2 in level flight during testing before the costly, complex program was cancelled.

Variants

Built only as two prototypes; the approach was abandoned in favor of conventional and thrust-vectoring VTOL concepts pursued elsewhere in Europe.

Where you'll see it

Never entered service; only V-02 was lost, on 28 November 1966, and V-01 survives on display at the Musee de l'Air et de l'Espace at Le Bourget and the program ended in the late 1960s.

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