Italian Forces

Lighting on Italian hands

The lone Lockheed P-38 Lightning fall into Italian hands during WW2. This plane landed out of fuel at Capoterra airfield, Southern Sardinia, on 12 June 1943 for a compass failure, resulting in 30 degrees error on the route, when the pilot flying from Malta to Gibraltar (or according other sources from Tunis to Pantelleria, just occupied by Allied forces). Moved to Guidonia’s Flight Test Center, near Rome, for evaluation by Italian pilots, the aircraft was employed by Lt. Col. Angelo Tondi for a series of combat tests. On August 11, 1943, Tondi claimed a B-24 shoot down off the Anzio coast, but the career of Regia Aeronautica’s Lightning was extremely brief: the German synthetic fuel used by Italians corroded the fuel tanks which was phased out and grounded. The Italian Air Force had the Lightning in regular service only after the war when a number of this twin engine fighter, P-38L and F-5, was sell by US Government to Italian Air Force, now Aeronautica Militare, and employed by 3rd and 4th Stormo. At least one Lighting was converted on tandem two-seat by IMAM at Naples. Victor Sierra