x planes

(via the SDASM Archives on Flickr)

“A 457th Fighter Squadron North American P-51 nicknamed “My Girl”, takes off from Iwo Jima, in the Bonin Islands. From this hard-won base our fighters escorted the B-29s on bombing missions to Japan, and also attacked the Empire on their own.” (via)

“Squadron Leader J A F MacLachlan, the one-armed Commanding Officer of No 1 Squadron RAF, standing beside his all-black Hawker Hurricane Mark IIC night fighter, ‘JX-Q’, at Tangmere, Sussex. MacLachlan flew bombers in France in 1940, but transferred to fighters in June 1940 and shot down 6 enemy aircraft during the Battle of Britain.

He joined No. 261 Squadron RAF in Malta, as a flight commander, and was shot down in February 1941, as a result of which his left arm was amputated. He quickly returned to operations after being fitted with an artificial limb, flying with No. 73 Squadron in North Africa, but in July 1941 returned to the United Kingdom to take command of No. 1 Squadron.

The Hurricane is sporting his personal emblem showing his amputated arm waving a ‘V’ sign. He was again shot down in 1943 and became a prisoner-of-war, by which time his score had risen to 16.5 victories [Critically injured, he died on 31 July 1943].” (via)

“A bomb dropped by a plane of the 463rd Bomb Group, 774th Bomb Squadron, 15th Af, falls toward a biouac area in Bologna, Italy, as a formation of medium bombers, flying much lower, also seeks out its target. October 12 1944” (via)

“The Last Kamikaze” (via)
9th August 1945, USS Wasp

The USS Borie was also attacked on this day

“1950’s — A young “cowboy”, the son of a member of the Air Force Flight Test Center, Edwards Air Force Base, California, looks over the Convair built YB-60 during its visit at Edwards from the Fort Worth, Texas, plant. 1953 (U.S. Air Force photo)” (via)

art from the highly agreeable-looking “PROJECT TERMINATED - Famous Military Aircraft Cancellations of the Cold War and What Might Have Been”, by Erik Simonsen, Speciality Press

“The Lockheed YF-12A was undoubtedly the most advanced interceptor ever built by the United States and was capable of Mach 3 at altitudes exceeding 80,000 feet. The aircraft was equipped with a longrange radar and three Hughes AIM-47 Falcon missiles with nuclear warheads. Weapons systems tests proved remarkably successful, and after the YF-12 program was cancelled, the radar and missiles formed the basis of the system used on the Grumman F-14 Tomcat” (via)

“R.O. Garlington inspects the tail gun of a Convair B-58 airplane.” (via)

the HL-20 Personnel Launch System mock-up, circa 1990 (via)

Convair XFY-1 (via the SDASM Archives on Flickr)

“Seeking a more realistic test environment for pressure suits, engineers at Douglas Aircraft installed the cockpit from the prototype XF4D Skyray in a large altitude chamber at the El Segundo, CA, facility. The David Clark Model 7 was among the first pressure suits evaluated in the test rig, which was representative of, but not identical to, the D558 research airplane” (via this amazing pdf)

“US Navy pilot of F7U-3 Cutlass wearing a possible US Navy C-1A partial pressure flight suit.” (via)

Vought F7U Cutlass (via the SDASM Archives on Flickr)

“The Hindenburg before she blew up in Lakehurst N.J.” (via the Boston Public Library on Flickr)