Warbird Information Exchange

This aircraft served as General Jimmy Doolittle's personal aircraft! Caption: "P-38J-10-LO Lightning (serial number 42-67402). Photo taken while assigned to the 8th Air Force as a personal aircraft for Gen Jimmy Doolittle. Very first P-38J-10-LO model built by Lockheed. Aircraft damaged in a ground accident (hit by taxiing P-38 while parked) 17 Dec 44 at Warton, England. Repaired and subsequently transferred to the 430th Fighter Squadron, 474th Fighter Group as K6-F. Aircraft damaged in a landing accident at airfield R-2, Bad Langensalza, Germany on 4 June 1945."
https://www.americanairmuseum.com/media ... pSrJZImiXc

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“Knowing what’s right, doesn’t mean much unless you do what’s right.”

And when he didn't want the complication of two engines he had this one.

He used more than one P-38.
LGEN James H. Doolittle in the cockpit of P-38H 42-66972 somewhere in England after returning from the Mediterranean to take command of the 8th AF.

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When I was young "sex was safe & flying was dangerous".

It looks like the shell ejection holes are taped over for some reason.Was that common for a P-38?

Gun barrels are, also.

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remember the Oogahonk!
old school enthusiast of Civiltary Warbirds and Air Racers

P-38's were known to have poor cockpit heating, especially for the pilots feet. Perhaps, this being a transit flight, eliminating sources of draft might make sense.

I think the caption is poorly written. Maybe by accident, maybe to cause readers to think he flew the P-38 from Italy to England. Without knowledge of the facts, I seriously doubt that's what happened. You don't risk a General and all he knows by having him conduct a lengthy flight over occupied territory on a repositioning flight.

My guess is this photo was indeed taken after he flew back from the Med. Probably days or weeks after.

That OD P-38 was most likely ‘a’ P-38 he flew but the NMF P-38 was ‘the’ P-38 dedicated for him to fly to base inspections in England I would think.

I should at least mention that the fuselage insignia on the NMF P-38 is unusually incorrect with the white star extending to the edge of the blue disk. Jimmy, what were you thinking?

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Scott Thompson
Aero Vintage Books
http://www.aerovintage.com
WIX Subscriber Since July 2017

I noticed that as well. I have seem many examples of unusually large, small and irregular configurations. More than one would think.

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“Knowing what’s right, doesn’t mean much unless you do what’s right.”

From Ivie's "Patton's Eyes in the Sky"

Per his bio, Doolittle frequently flew, sometimes on combat missions, while in command in the ETO.

Given the amount of insignia changes in '43, is it possible this P-38 started life with the blue roundel and white star insignia that was used through June of '43, and the updated bars were added later, incorrectly? I've seen some posts complaining about inaccurate insignias on restorations, but it seems that innaccuracies can actually be historically accurate...

The odd thing is that even the star doesn't look geometrically correct, setting aside the mis-proportioned bars.

Also the serial on the tail doesn't look like the standard font.

Could this bird have been delivered in OD/NG and stripped in the field, then the markings reapplied? That type of thing accounts for 99% of the times when you see non-standard markings on wartime aircraft. This one is so far off that I would doubt that even an MU would have done it.

August

Can you imagine being responsible for hitting Jimmy Doolittle's personal aircraft???

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Life member, 91st BG Memorial Association
Owner, 1944 Willys MB #366014
Former REMF (US Army, O3)