Lockheed P-38L Lightning, N25Y / 422-8509, The Flying Bulls
This picture is © Martin Laycock and may not be used or published without permission.
Registration: N25Y
Construction Number: 422-8509
Model Lockheed P-38L Lightning
Operator: The Flying Bulls
Airport: Duxford (QFO / EGSU), UK - England
Photographer: Martin Laycock
Date Taken: 10/07/2011
Date Submitted: 15/07/2011
Another star of Flying Legends 2011, this P-38 Lightning is currently the only one of the type flying in Europe. Operated by The Flying Bulls, she's based in Salzburg, Austria. She served with the United States Army Air Corps as 44-53254 until being struck off charge in September 1945. Like many other surplus combat aircraft she was stored at Kingman, Arizona but escaped the scrapman being sold to the Lilee Products Company of Chicago, Illinois in April 1946 and registered NX25Y. She was acquired by J. D. Reed Co. of Houston, Texas in 1947 who used her for air racing with the race number 14 and named 'Sky Ranger' piloted by Charles "Firewall" Walling. She would pass through a succession of private owners and also the Confederate Air Force, but she is probably best known as the mount of Marvin L. "Lefty" Gardner who flew her in an overall white scheme, the aircraft becoming known as 'White Lightnin'. Gardner raced her several times at the Reno National Air Races, initially with the race number 25 but he later changed it to 13. Unfortunately the aircraft suffered an engine failure resulting in a wheels up landing in a cotton field at Greenwood, Mississippi on the 25th June 2001. Thankfully, Gardner's son Ladd escaped from the wreckage. The remains of the aircraft were bought by The Flying Bulls in January 2005 and she was restored in Breckenridge, Texas, making her first post restoration flight on the 2nd June 2008. She arrived in Europe in 2009 and is now based at Red Bull's Hangar 7 complex in Salzburg.
Picture ID:1301627