Hangar 11 is one of Europe’s most popular warbird operators and on Sunday, Peter Teichman invited the aviation community to North Weald airfield for the unveiling of his P-40N’s latest paint scheme.
The P-40N Kittyhawk is one of four historic aircraft that are based at Hangar 11 and after a couple of seasons as ‘Clawin’ Kitty’, Peter and the team decided that it was time for some new colours. At ten past eleven, the engineers rolled back the covers to reveal the spectacular artwork of ‘Lulu Belle’.
42-104590 was one of two P-40Ns to be painted up as ‘Lulu Belle’ and was flown by 2nd Lt Philip Adair who was assigned to the China-Burma-India theatre between 1942-1944. The highly decorated fighter pilot was deployed with the 50th Fighter Group who were tasked with flying over 139 combat missions in 1943 to protect the Yossan Valley – the infamous Hump route into China.
The aircraft was sprayed in the standard factory scheme of ANA and then returned to North Weald to have it’s nose art finished off. The skull and lettering of ‘Lulu Belle’ was all hand painted in a flat finish to give maximum effect when up in the air.
It’s fair to say that the team at Hangar 11 have done a fantastic job of reproducing one of the most famous P-40s to have ever graced the skies over the Pacific region and I look forward to seeing it again!
Many thanks to Peter Teichman and the rest of the team based at North Weald.
The full set of photographs from Sunday will be available on the Facebook page.
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