Lockheed Martin Aircraft
Lockheed P-38 Lightning
Manufactured 1941–45 Introduction date July 1941
First flight 27 January 1939

The Lockheed P-38 Lightning is an American single-seat, twin piston-engined fighter aircraft that was used during World War II. Developed for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) by the Lockheed Corporation, the P-38 incorporated a distinctive twin-boom design with a central nacelle containing the cockpit and armament. Along with its use as a general fighter, the P-38 was used in various aerial combat roles, including as a highly effective fighter-bomber, a night fighter, and a long-range escort fighter when equipped with drop tanks. The P-38 was also used as a bomber-pathfinder, guiding streams of medium and heavy bombers, or even other P-38s equipped with bombs, to their targets. Used in the aerial reconnaissance role, the P-38 accounted for 90 percent of American aerial film captured over Europe

Lockheed formed a secretive engineering team to implement the project apart from the main factory; this approach later became known as Skunk Works. The Lockheed design team, under the direction of Hall Hibbard and Clarence "Kelly" Johnson, considered a range of twin-engined configurations, including both engines in a central fuselage with push–pull propellers..

Operational history

A P-38 Lightning warbird over Chino Airport in 2009

The Lockheed Corporation designed the P-38 in response to a February 1937 specification from the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). Circular Proposal X-608 was a set of aircraft performance goals authored by First Lieutenants Benjamin S. Kelsey and Gordon P. Saville for a twin-engined, high-altitude "interceptor" having "the tactical mission of interception and attack of hostile aircraft at high altitude." Forty years later, Kelsey explained that Saville and he drew up the specification using the word "interceptor" as a way to bypass the inflexible Army Air Corps requirement for pursuit aircraft to carry no more than 500 lb (230 kg) of armament including ammunition, and to bypass the USAAC restriction of single-seat aircraft to one engine. Kelsey was looking for a minimum of 1,000 lb (450 kg) of armament. Kelsey and Saville aimed to get a more capable fighter, better at dog fighting and at high-altitude combat. Specifications called for a maximum airspeed of at least 360 mph (580 km/h) at altitude, and a climb to 20,000 ft (6,100 m) within six minutes,the toughest set of specifications USAAC had ever presented. The unbuilt Vultee XP1015 design was offered to fill this requirement, but was not advanced enough to merit further investigation. A similar proposal for a single-engined fighter was issued at the same time, Circular Proposal X-609, in response to which the Bell P-39 Airacobra was designed. Both proposals required liquid-cooled Allison V-1710 engines with turbosuperchargers and gave extra points for tricycle landing gear . Wiki Link