09/30/2015. Remarks by Johan Visschedijk: "Under the Lend-Lease program the British government ordered 1,500 P-40Ds/P-40Es, designated Kittyhawk Mk.I and Mk.IA. These were allotted the serials ET100 to ET999 and EV100 to EV699, although intended to be used by the British forces, many were retained in the USA and a number was diverted to other nations.

Under the USAAF serial 41-35918, the pictured aircraft was built as a P-40E-1 Warhawk by Curtiss in Buffalo, New York. It was assigned the British serial ET564 and the designation Kittyhawk Mk.IA. Subsequently it was diverted to the Soviet Union on April 4, 1942, soon thereafter it was lost near the Arctic Circle and lay abandoned in the frozen tundra for some fifty years.

In 1992 it was retrieved from the tundra and transferred to the USA, where it was bought by Gerald D. Yagen of Virginia Beach, Virginia. In 2001 it was shipped to New Zealand where it was restored by AvSpec Ltd. in Auckland. The restored aircraft was finished in the markings of David Lee 'Tex' Hill of the American Volunteer Group (AVG), the Flying Tiger's, in China, 1942. Flown again in 2003, the aircraft returned to the USA."