Fighter catapult ships also known as Catapult Armed Ships were an attempt by the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 to provide air cover at sea. Five ships were acquired and commissioned as Naval vessels early in the Second World War

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 and these were used to accompany convoy

Convoy

A convoy is a group of vehicles, typically motor vehicles or ships, traveling together for mutual support and protection. Often, a convoy is organized with armed defensive support, though it may also be used in a non-military sense, for example when driving through remote areas.-Age of Sail:Naval...

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The concept was extended to merchant ships which were also equipped with rocket assisted launch systems and known as Catapult Aircraft Merchantmen (CAM ship

CAM ship

CAM ships were World War II-era British merchant ships used in convoys as an emergency stop-gap until sufficient escort carriers became available. CAM is an acronym for catapult aircraft merchantman. A CAM ship was equipped with a rocket-propelled catapult launching a single Hawker Sea Hurricane,...

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The ships

There were five fighter catapult ships, collectively known as the Pegasus class. Two, Patia and Springbank were lost during the war. They were each equipped with a single Fairey Fulmar

Fairey Fulmar

The Fairey Fulmar was a British carrier-borne fighter aircraft that served with the Fleet Air Arm during the Second World War. A total of 600 were built by Fairey Aviation at its Stockport factory between January 1940 and December 1942...

 or "Hurricat" (an adapted Hawker Hurricane

Hawker Hurricane

The Hawker Hurricane is a British single-seat fighter aircraft that was designed and predominantly built by Hawker Aircraft Ltd for the Royal Air Force...

 Mk.1A).

Ship	Launched	Converted	Notes
Ariguani (F105)	1926	1940	Former Ocean Boarding Vessel Ocean boarding vessel Ocean boarding vessels were merchant ships taken over by the Royal Navy for the purpose of enforcing wartime blockades by intercepting and boarding foreign vessels.-Ships:-References:... , converted to a catapult ship in 1940, war service in the Atlantic after being damaged repaired in 1943 and returned to merchant use.
Maplin		1940	Former Ocean Boarding Vessel. Maplin saw war service in the Atlantic in 1940. She was a training ship from 1941 to 1944, in reserve from September 1944 and subsequently an accommodation ship. Maplins war service was focused on Atlantic convoys and her "Hurricat" was the first to destroy an enemy aircraft, a Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Focke-Wulf Fw 200 The Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor, also known as Kurier to the Allies was a German all-metal four-engine monoplane originally developed by Focke-Wulf as a long-range airliner...  "Condor" in August 1941. The pilot was Robert W H Everett Robert W H Everett Robert William Hanmer Everett, DSO was a British jockey and World War II pilot. In 1929, on Gregalach, he won the prestigious steeplechase the Grand National and in 1941 as a Fleet Air Arm pilot, he achieved the first "kill" by a rocket-launched fighter, shooting down a long-range Focke-Wulf Fw...  of 804 Naval Air Squadron 804 Naval Air Squadron 804 Naval Air Squadron was a Naval Air Squadron of the Royal Navy, formed in November 1939 from part of 769 NAS Sea Gladiators which had been detached to RNAS Hatston. The squadron was merged into 800 NAS in June 1944 and subsequently reformed in September.-World War II:During World War II, she... .
Patia	1922	1941	Former Ocean Boarding Vessel. Lost 1941 Foundered after bombing attack
Pegasus HMS Ark Royal (1914) HMS Ark Royal was the first ship in history designed and built as a seaplane carrier. She was purchased by the Royal Navy in 1914 shortly after her keel had been laid and the ship was only in frames; this allowed the ship's design to be modified almost totally to accommodate seaplanes...	1914	1940	Commissioned as seaplane carrier HMS Ark Royal HMS Ark Royal (1914) HMS Ark Royal was the first ship in history designed and built as a seaplane carrier. She was purchased by the Royal Navy in 1914 shortly after her keel had been laid and the ship was only in frames; this allowed the ship's design to be modified almost totally to accommodate seaplanes...  in 1914, renamed Pegasus in 1934.
Springbank	1926	1940	Former auxiliary anti-aircraft cruiser. Torpedoed and sunk 27 September 1941.