Picture of the day

Excellent pictures Diopter.

Do you have any pictures of Spit I with Portuguese Squadron badges,personal makings etc?While squadron codes and cocardes are known for size and location I have yet to see other markings even in plastic model kits.

What were those Spits and Hurricanes used for in Portugal? Home defense or colonial service ?

As for Italian planes it's been known since ww1 that while Italians can make good airframes making reliable engine and all systems around it was their Achilles heel.

Kind of like British use to have with electrical systems in bikes,cars,homes,fridges etc.

Lucas Electric...the Prince of Darkness!
 
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Tough to find a Mk1.

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https://www.lowapproach.be/museums/portugal/museu-do-ar-portugal/

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They got a shipment of M3 'Stuarts' from Canada sometime after WWII. Maybe part of that batch. The Cdn. Stuarts were used in the Portuguese Colonial War. They were obsolete but were used up there mainly.

Go to YouTube and search for videos by a tank girl named Rita Sobral https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsIPPmHoHFY She likes to talk about vehicles, and in one mentions three M5A1s which were selected for use in Angola(?) and were heavily used as convoy escorts. They were driven something astonishing like 30,000 kms, before finally completely collapsing. Although the staff tried to get more shipped from Metropolitan Portugal, they were apparently blocked by NATO rules.
 
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Gladiator Mk II of the Expeditionary Squadron Esquadrilha (EEC2) on Terceira Island, Azores, in 1941.

The two squadrilles of Gladiator (30 fighters) secured the continent's air defense between 1938 and 1941,. They were subsequently sent to the Azores, where they acted until the end of the war. Still tried to intercept some Luftwaffe FW200 Condor but unsuccessful. Back to the continent, they provided stunts training until 1953.

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Notice the Mosquito art on fuselage.

A comment on Portuguese page:
"Luís Veríssimo:
In Portugal, there's an oral tradition of Gladiator, UK mfs stalling old and rotten material so they don't ' give ' Spitfires.
As already said:
- there was a need to equip RAF
- and priorities have been realigned, to equip countries made relevant by the Munich crisis. Portugal was only relevant by the Azores.
What is never said:
- Portugal was not an Ally - and nothing neutral!
Even the Greeks, allies against Italy, placed 10th for Spitfires and received... Gladiators.
- Portugal wasn't a normal customer: it was playing with everyone and fiercely trading tassels for the Azores (for bases control and Faial's global telegraphy business).
- Spitfire was a huge jump in modernity, but Gladiator was operational and gave an Ace-in-a-day in 41.
- But most importantly, Portugal strongly squeezed Supermarine with the discounts it claimed to have from BFW (Messerschmitt), having at least one AM pilot went to the German factory for a test drive...
Being all business and geo-strategy, the narrative of the poor thing abandoned by the British who stuck rotten material does not reap, in particular in view of the performance fulfilled in the Azores, in a saline environment.
Historically, at the beginning of the 2th GM we did a muscle neutrality. Negotiation was blooded and, in the context, Portugal was sagacious to draw everything it could, under the conditions of the time - including 2th line of Gloster Gladiator, Miles Martinet, etc.
Of course, the purchases in Germany then paid off, when Brittania was already more unobstructed and had the situation controlled - we only recovered when NATO encompassed us. "

Note: Faial is an island in the Azores island chain.
 
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The possibility of pristine FW190s buried in Turkey is nil, possibly even less. FW190s were not "built to resist corrosion", and nothing looks "pristine" after being buried for 75 years unless it's soaked in cosmoline and packed airtight.

I'm thinking if these aircraft actually exist, the real value will be in bigger bits - engines, perhaps - and airframe ID plates, around which one can build a functional aircraft. But the idea of an Indiana Jones unearthing to the Lost Focke Wulfs of Turkey is so wildly optimistic as to be fiction. My guess is Buddy is hoping for funding, much of which he'll spend on hookers and coke.
 
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Members of VMF-214, better known as the Black Sheep Squadron appear to be getting ready for a baseball game. And what better place to have the team photo taken, than standing on the wings of a Corsair. This one is inside its revetment at Turtle Bay Fighter Airfield on Santo, September 1943. Thanks to the US Archives for the shot.
 
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A Curtiss SB2C-5 Helldiver from the Portuguese Naval Aviation, going into a diving run over the river Sado, near Setúbal, south of Lisbon. 1950s

The serial number seems to be AS-5. In 1950 the Naval Aviation received 24 Helldivers which got numbered AS-1 to 24.

Original: Portuguese Navy Archives
 
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