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Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
According to the T9 link the cannon was manufactured by Colt. I'm sure the info here is correct but it would be nice if the two articles concurred. Maybe a note on the cannon page listing other manufacturers? 75.143.19.122 (talk) 18:13, 13 November 2021 (UTC)
Date of First Flight?
Latest comment: 1 year ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Note 1 refers to some sources saying the date of the First Flight was 6th April 1939 and refers to this "Talk" pages for a discussion that apparently concluded the date was in 1938. - That discussion seems to have been deleted. The topic was bought up in the British aviation Magazine "Air International" in 1977. - A letter printed in the November 1977 edition was sent in by a Mr Don M Ives of Bridgeport Ct USA. He enclosed a newspaper cutting from the New York Times of 16th April 1939 - The cutting reads- that the Bell XP-39.... "had been shipped to Wright Field, Dayton by rail in January and had undergone extensive ground testing and engineering work prior to its first flight", and that "much to the surprise of observers here, it was flown first during the Army Day observance last week." 77.100.216.20 (talk) 18:25, 17 May 2023 (UTC)
The previous discussion was archived, not deleted. You can see it at Talk:Bell_P-39_Airacobra/Archive_2#First_flight_date_and_early_history. By December 2012 we had arrived at the solution of showing the 1938 date and adding the note about conflicting 1939 sources. Some very detailed accounts of the Bell timeline confirm 1938. Binksternet (talk) 20:00, 17 May 2023 (UTC)
