Happy Friday. To kick this weekend off early check out this video of a newly discovered RAF Curtis P-40 Warhawk that has sat undiscovered in near perfect condition in the Sahara Desert in Egypt since crash-landing there during World War II.
The American-made P-40 was being flown by its RAF pilot, a 24-year old Flight Sgt. Dennis Copping, to a British base in Northern Eygpt for repairs when it suffered engine trouble and Copping made a crash landing 200-miles from the nearest town. Poor Copping tried to repair the engine and shelter himself from the deadly sun with his parachute, but his efforts were to no avail and he died somewhere in the desert.
The plane, one of thousand of P-40s made for the U.S. and its allies, was discovered recently by a Polish oil company worker and it's remarkably intact. The video below shows the cockpit and ammo looking almost new, certainly not 70 years old.
Now, the P-40 is supposedly going to be shipped to the RAF museum in the UK but museum officials had better act quickly since scavengers are already beginning to remove parts from the aircraft!
The P-40 was a late 1930s-vintage design and was becoming obsolete by the time Copping crashed this one in 1942 -- the type would soon be replaced in U.S. service by the more capable and legendary P-38 Lightning,P-47 Thunderbolt and P-51 Mustang. While P-40s are most famous for their American service it was with the British Commonwealth's Desert Air Force in North Africa and the Middle East that the plane first saw combat.
Click through the jump for the video.
Via Gizmodo.
Click here to see more pics.
