Akutan Zero

[pampa14]

In July 1942, the United States captured the first Japanese Zero fighter. The link below provides information and photos of this aircraft, called the Akutan Zero:

Aviação em Floripa: Akutan Zero


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[nuuumannn]

Interesting as always. EB-201 is/was an A6M3-32 with clipped wingtips captured in PNG. TAIC was the Technical Air Intelligence Center at NAS Anacostia and its aircraft were numbered sequentially from when they arrived, the Aleutian Zero being TAIC 1. This department incorporated expertise from the Technical Air Intelligence Unit at Eagle Farm in Brisbane that had assembled and captured a number of Japanese aircraft there, including EB-201 before it was shipped to the USA, although it went to the USAAF at Wright Pat and not the navy TAIC.

TAIC 7 was captured at Saipan and survives today at the National Air and Space Museum, Washington DC. TAIC 8 was an A6M5 captured at Saipan also and was assigned to a unit trialling Bell P-59 and Lockheed P-80 jet fighters. Also visible in the fourth picture from the bottom is Nakajima B5N TAIC 6 which was captured in 1944 and was of immediate interest because it was fitted with ASV radar. The Zero in the foreground is possibly TAIC 5, an A6M5-52.