Nakajima KI43 1B Hayabusa Oscar

I found a very rare old fighter from the Japanese Imperial Army Air Service. It was abandoned at the end of WW2 but salvaged and kept together. Paul Allen bought the plane and sent it for an extensive restoration in New Zealand. It was completely disassembled and made flyable in 1999. It accidentally made a short flight during a high speed taxi test. I'm not sure if it was ever flown in the USA but it is sitting in the Flying Heritage & Armor Museum in Everett Washington.
Wikipedia has a photo of this plane in 1945 abandoned on Rabaul Island. It is the only one I've seen with a two blade propeller.
This channel spends most of it's time covering aircraft that I find in my travels. I am particularily interested in the stories and pictures of an individual aircraft and it's post military history. This channel is working to provide a current video look-see of real airplanes. It is a special moment when we meet museum staff that allows us addition "behind the scenes" access to these vintage aircraft. It is the hugest fun ever to do this kind of work and it would seem that many people are interested in my amatuer enthusiasm. I do not preport to be an expert in anything but please come along for the ride and see what we get up to. Recently we rode dirtbikes out to the XB-70 crash site memorial and ain Atwater we got inside a SAC USAF B-36 bomber. That's our highlight so far. Please hit SUBSCRIBE to help us along.

[@desertduke1]

It may be the only flyable Oscar, but the Pima Air museum also has a ki-43 on static display

[@AviationMoviesWithNorman]

Cool, I will be down there in a couple of months. I'll definitely look out for it. Thanks for the info

[@DCS_World_Japan]

Just a pronunciation tip, the "j" in Japanese is pronounced like a normal "j" rather than a "y." So the "ji" in "jima" would be the same as the sound in "jeep."

[@AviationMoviesWithNorman]

Thank-you

[@iskandartaib]

@@DCS_World_Japan I guess romaji is based on the English pronunciation of the letters rather than the German or the Spanish..

[@iskandartaib]

Early one with 2 bladed fixed pitch propeller? I doubt the later ones had those..

[@AviationMoviesWithNorman]

I wonder if it was an early one or one that had been repaired. there is a picture of this airplane when it was found and it has the two blade prop.

[@lunardoesbests]

Is this the only working plane or no?

[@andrewmacdonald4833]

Correct..that's what he says in the video...

[@AviationMoviesWithNorman]

But I don't think they have run it since 2019 and I'm not sure if they ever flew it.

[@briancooper2112]

Duh.

[@briancooper2112]

You expect only 1 sample to fly? Come on.