FIRST PILOT TO LAND
DECIDED TO TAKE CHANCE (Received Sept. 8, 1 p.m.) LONDON, Sept. 7 The honour of being the first pilot to land on the mainland of Italy went to a Spitfire pilot. Running short of petrol, he decided to take a chance and land on the Reggio airfield early on Friday afternoon. This occurred while he was returning from sweeps covering the advancing troops. “I was over Reggio at the time, saw the airfield and decided to take the chance,” he said. When the Reggio airfield was captured early on Friday, Royal Air Force service commandos, with the assistance of sappers, were at work within a few hours repairing the runway and field. Scattered around the airfield they found the remains of 56 A.xis planes. Many had been wrecked by Allied bombs but others were disabled or destroyed by the Axis to prevent them falling into Allied hands intact.
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Waikato Times, Volume 132, Issue 22137, 8 September 1943, Page 5
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152FIRST PILOT TO LAND Waikato Times, Volume 132, Issue 22137, 8 September 1943, Page 5
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