YP-80 44-83028 on the Pierced Steel Planking (PSP) at the Lesina airfield in Southern Italy, in its original, high-gloss ‘Pearl Grey’ finish (Aircraft Grey ANA 512).

Two Lockheed YP-80A Shooting Star, jet fighters were shipped to the MTO under Project Extraversion on December 26, 1944, arriving in Italy in late December '44 / early January '45. They became the first, true jet planes to have flown in Italy (and the MTO), beating to it the Luftwaffe's Arado 234B recon jets, which did not begin flight operations until March 1945 and are almost universally quoted as the first true jet planes to have flown in Italy, instead.

The two aircraft 44-83028 and 44-83029, Lockheed cn 1007 and 1008, respectively, were flown by Wright Field personnel who received general support from some of the units stationed in Italy, and ended up with the 1st FG, sometime in April 1945. According to An Escort of P-38s, The 1st Fighter Group in World War II, by John D. Mullins, the aircraft were '...brought over in early April by a Wright Field contingent, "for testing under combat conditions in a remote location" ' and were quickly dubbed the "33rd Air Force".

One of the 1st FG pilots, Major Ed LaClare, logged two flights on the YP-80A. Mr. James Bertoglio, then a photographer with the 94th FS, who provided most of the pictures herein linked, clearly remembers one mission being flown "up north", i.e. toward the front line. Bertoglio also recalled the oddity of the aircraft being flown by both test and operational pilots, but being maintained exclusively by civilian personnel (Lockheed?). Is it only a coincidence that the 1st FG pilots began conversion on the YP-80A, only weeks after the appearance of the Luftwaffe’s jets over the Allied lines?

Click on photos for closeups

The three pictures above, by J.Bertoglio, show the aircraft in the new, ‘operational’ paint-job. The tail/fin sports now a chevron-pattern (possibly red and white) with red (?) stripes on nose, fuselage and wings. A large, black (?) letter is painted on the nose, for recognition purpose, the serial numbers being now painted over: “A” is 44-83028 and “B” is 44-83029.