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The P-61 radar operator occupied a separate compartment in the rear of the fuselage accessed from a hatch below. In August 1940, sixteen months before the United States entered the war, the U.S. Air Officer in London, Lieutenant General Delos C. Emmons, was briefed on British research in radar ("Radio Detection And Ranging" as it was then known), which had been underway since 1935, and had ...
In September, the first American-built dedicated night fighters began to arrive, the Northrup YP-61 Black Widow and a few production P-61As. In January 1944 the entire program moved to Hammer Field , California and was placed under IV Fighter Command .
The first USAAF unit using the P-61 did not move to Britain until February 1944; operational use did not start until the summer, and was limited throughout the war. Colonel Winston Kratz, director of night-fighter training in the USAAF, considered the P-61 as adequate in its role, "It was a good night fighter. It did not have enough speed". [35]
425th Squadron P-61 [note 3] The squadron was established on 23 November 1943, as the 425th Night Fighter Squadron at Orlando AAB, Florida and activated on 1 December. It initially trained with the Douglas P-70 Havoc night fighter at Orlando, although it also trained with the Northrop YP-61 Black Widow.
Production delays at Northrop for the P-61 Black Widow fighter aircraft required the unit to use what it had until the first YP-61s were received in early 1944. [3] In October, it was decided to form specialized night fighter training squadrons, and the 348th and 349th Night Fighter Squadrons were formed, [ 5 ] largely from elements of the 50th ...
The squadron received the P-61 Black Widow to replace the P-38s/P-70s in June 1944. [5] The squadron and its detachments moved several times throughout New Guinea providing cover for U.S. Army assault landings , shipping reconnaissance while protecting the various new air bases.
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