While playing "follow the link" tonight I stumbled upon an interesting LA-7 profile.
From:
http://www.airaces.narod.ru/all1/alelyhin.htmGuards Major A. Alelyuhina flew I-16s, LaGG3s, Yak1s, P-39s and La-7s. He was credited with 57 kills, 40 individual plus 17 shared in 601 sorties, 258 invo;ving combat. He was shot down at least once and wounded in combat more than once.
Anyway, In July 1944 his group switched from P-39s to La-7s. He flew a "traditional" looking plane, inscribed "on board the Aleksey Alelyuhinu from the collective trust №: 41 NCAP". A "donated" aircraft. It also carried his personal marking, a red heart with an arrow thru it.
In the final days of the war, he was having a discussion with a fellow pilot about life,
An interesting story happened with the La-7. In April 1945, as told Aleksei Vasil'evich like - that evening, they sat and drank with his technique. Alelyuhin talked about life after the war and that it would be nice to put a monument to the La-7: paint it red and raised on a pedestal. The next morning the regiment was raised on combat alert and Alelyuhin, putting on track ran to his plane. What was his astonishment when he saw that his whole car was blindingly red!
In the words of Alexei V., he was "in gratitude" already reaching for his gun, but the time to deal with the technician was not there. Since the last days of the war he flew on a red La-7. The Germans on radio began to call him not only as the "Russian Red Baron." Then, after fighting what drove - the inspection, and La-7 Alelyuhina again became gray.
As near as I can tell, from google translation, he flew the LA-7 this way for the final few days of the was, whereupon it was returned to its original Grey paint scheme.
How many flights constitute inclusion as a skin? We have, after all, a red Me163 which seems to have been painted that way in the same kind of circumstances.
Red LA-7 anyone?
wrongway
