Finland decided to develop an indigenous fighter that had better performance than the license-built D. XXI prior to the Winter War, but that conflict forced any such efforts to be postponed. Development began in earnest after the end of the Winter War and the first flight was on 23 December 1941. Not surprisingly for a first effort, the Myrsky suffered from many teething problems that included wing failure the port elevator being torn off in a dive. A number of structural modifications had to be made to aircraft on the production line that further delayed its introduction into service. The three pre-production aircraft were referred to as the I series and the remaining 47 aircraft on order comprised the II series. 14 of these were completed by the end of July 1944 and another 16 by the Armistice on 4 September with production being completed by 30 December. An additional batch of ten had been ordered as Myrsky IIIs in early 1944, but this was cancelled after the Armistice.

The Myrsky's performance didn't compare to the Bf 109G's and it wasn't wanted by the fighter units, especially after all its structural problems during flight testing! The reconnaissance units were in no position to be as picky as they were extremely short of aircraft and TLeLv 12 received some 20 aircraft before the Armistice. It flew 66 sorties before that date with no losses recorded and only a couple of Soviet fighters claimed damaged. TLeLv 16 also received 6 Myrskys before the Armistice, but weren't yet operational when it took effect.

More WWII Aircraft of the Finnish Air Force

Brewster B-239 (Buffalo)
Bristol Blenheim and Bulldog
Curtis H-75A Hawk
Dornier Do17Z and Do22K
Fiat G.50
Fokker C.Ve and D.XXI
Gloster Gauntlet and Gladiator
Hawker Hurricane I
Ilyushin DB-3M and IL-4
Junkers Ju88A
Messerschmidt Bf109G
Morane-Saulnier MS406/410
Polikarpov I-153
Tupolev SB-2
VL Myrsky II
Europa Reinforcement/Replacement Charts