Cruciform tail

BAe Jetstream 31 with cruciform tail

The cruciform tail is an aircraft empennage configuration which, when viewed from the aircraft's front or rear, looks much like a cross. The usual arrangement is to have the horizontal stabilizer intersect the vertical tail somewhere near the middle, and above the top of the fuselage.

Often this arrangement is chosen to keep the tail out of the engines' wake or to avoid complex interference drag.

The empennage of the Dornier Do 335, on which the horizontal stabilizers emerged from the fuselage between an upper and lower vertical fin, is also described as cruciform.^{[citation needed]}

Cruciform tails are also used on many kind of airships, like classical Zeppelins.

Benefits

The cruciform tail gives the benefit of clearing the aerodynamics of the tail away from the wake of the engine, while not requiring the same amount of strengthening of the vertical tail section in comparison with a T-tail design.

Applications

Avro Canada CF-100 showing its cruciform design tail.

• A-4 Skyhawk
• Avro Canada CF-100
• B-1 Lancer
• Dassault Falcon
• de Havilland Canada DHC-3 Otter
• F-84 Thunderjet
• F-84F Thunderstreak
• Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner
• Jetstream 31
• British Aerospace Jetstream 41

• Gloster Meteor - a World War II era jet.
• Lockheed Jetstar
• Messerschmitt 262 - the first operational jet fighter.
• Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15
• PBY Catalina
• Roberts Cygnet
• Rockwell Commander 112
• Sud Aviation Caravelle
• US Aviation Cumulus

See also

• Pelikan tail
• T-tail
• Twin tail
• V-tail