Comparing the Hurricane and the Kittyhawk P40

Comparing the Hurricane and the Kittyhawk P40 By this time, they decided to convert the Kittyhawks, see. Squadrons were going to get Kittyhawks. In fact, some of them there had Tomahawks and were going to get Kittyhawks. Interviewer: And these are the American planes? Can you describe them? P40's? P40's. P40's yes. (Inaudible) and they were coming out in the middle east in the Spring of ‘42. Interviewer: How did they compare to a Hurricane? Well, they were lots better than a Hurricane operationally. They were faster and they had a better armourment. They had a 6.5's. The Hurricanes at that time had 8 machine guns or 12 machine guns. But later, they had the cannons but still it was better than a Hurricane. It was a faster air plane and a number of things better. But the squadrons were then all converting to Kittyhawks cause Messerschmitts were now shooting down everything in the air and you couldn’t do a show without running into them. And it didn’t take very many Messerschmitts to upset the whole...cause they could climb up above and come down and from behind and out of the sun. And they were shooting down all sorts of our air planes. We flew around in bigger gaggles and they had smaller groups. But by that time, they had, some of them had been there a year, or their pilots anyway, and they had big scores already. And they stayed on.