1/48 Eduard P-40M Profipack

by Chas Bunch

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Kits built OOB with the exception of drooped elevators and use of Squadron sliding portions of canopies.  Model Master paints and decals from Tally Ho sheet 48-004.

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These models represent the same aircraft - a Curtiss P-40M-10-CU, U.S. S/N 43-5925 which was sent to the Soviet Union under the Lend-Lease program in late 1943.  "White 23"  was assigned to the 191. IAP near Leningrad and was flown by Lt. V. A. Ryevin.  On December 27, 1943 Lt. Ryevin was having a bad day.  On a training flight he became disoriented and encountered deteriorating weather - low ceilings, rain, snow, and decreasing visibility.  Not to mention low fuel.  Lt Ryevin attempted to make a forced landing on a frozen lake near Kivennapa Ahijarvi, but was forced to abort and clear the area due to light anti-aircraft fire from Finnish forces in the area.  A short time later, Lt. Ryevin successfully landed White 23 on frozen Lake Valkarvi, and was taken prisoner and White 23 was captured intact in near-new condition.

White 23 was given a coat of Finnish olive green paint over the Curtiss factory O.D., new Finnish markings and yellow ID bands, and coded KH-51. ("KH" because the Finns believed it to be a Kittyhawk).  It was the one and only P-40 in the Finnish inventory, and was flown by pilots of HLeLv32 over Karelia in 1944.  It was never used on operations, only for evaluation.  At that point in the Continuation War the Finns were flying Bf-109s, which severely outclassed the P-40. KH-51 was stricken from the FAF inventory on July 30, 1945, but that was soon canceled because the FAF was not sure that KH-51 was included in the captured material that was to be returned to the Soviet Union.  The second and definitive removal from FAF inventory occurred on February 1, 1950 when KH-51 was sold to Kuusakoski Oy (a Finnish scrap dealer) for the sum of 9,000 Finnish Marks, joining the fate of hundreds of other aircraft after the war.  Kuusakoski Oy is still in business today.

Chas

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Photos and text © by Chas Bunch