Thunderbirds is a British mid-1960s science fiction television show devised by Gerry

Gerry Anderson

Gerry Anderson MBE is a British publisher, producer, director and writer, famous for his futuristic television programmes, particularly those involving specially modified marionettes, a process called "Supermarionation"....

 and Sylvia Anderson

Sylvia Anderson

Sylvia Anderson , born 25 March 1937, is a British voice artist and film producer, most notable for collaborations with Gerry Anderson, to whom she was married from 1962 to 1975....

 and made by AP Films

AP Films

AP Films or APF, later becoming Century 21 Productions, was a British independent film production company of the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s...

 using a form of marionette

Marionette

A marionette is a puppet controlled from above using wires or strings depending on regional variations. A marionette's puppeteer is called a manipulator. Marionettes are operated with the puppeteer hidden or revealed to an audience by using a vertical or horizontal control bar in different forms...

 puppetry

Puppetry

Puppetry is a form of theatre or performance which involves the manipulation of puppets. It is very ancient, and is believed to have originated 30,000 years BC. Puppetry takes many forms but they all share the process of animating inanimate performing objects...

 dubbed "Supermarionation

Supermarionation

Supermarionation is a puppetry technique devised in the 1960s by British production company AP Films. It was used extensively in the company's numerous Gerry and Sylvia Anderson-produced action-adventure series, the most famous of which was Thunderbirds...

". The series followed the adventures of International Rescue, a secretive organisation created to help those in grave danger using technically advanced equipment and machinery launched from its hidden Tracy Island

Tracy Island

Tracy Island is the home of the Tracy family in the Gerry and Sylvia Anderson 1960s television series Thunderbirds. Located in the South Pacific Ocean, the island's true function as the secret base of the International Rescue organisation is heavily camouflaged.Thunderbird 1 launches from a hangar...

 base. The series focused on the head of the organisation, ex-astronaut

Astronaut

An astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....

 Jeff Tracy

Jeff Tracy

Jeff Tracy is a fictional character from Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's Supermarionation television show Thunderbirds and the subsequent films Thunderbirds Are GO and Thunderbird 6. The voice for the character in these shows was supplied by Peter Dyneley. The character also appeared in the live...

, and his five sons who piloted the "Thunderbird" machines.