Yak-1 White 402 & 404, 45 iap, 27 iad

By Michal Sekula

Updated on November 1, 2020

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Interesting photo of two Yak-1 from 45 iap crashed into each other, dated to June 1941, outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, at Zabrat airport near Baku:



Source of the photo: http://www.airfield.narod.ru/yak/yak.html


45 iap was formed in April 1938 in Baku as a part 60 Air Brigade, equipped with I-16 and I-15bis planes. In May 1941 the regiment was re-armed to Yak-1 and became part of the 27 iad. This regiment became well-known latter. In September 1942 the regiment was re-armed to Bell P-39 Airacobra and Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawk. In June 1943 the 45 iap is transformed to the 100 giap as a part of 9 giad and flew P-39s until end of the war (source: http://allaces.ru/sssr/struct/p/iap45.php).


These Yak-1 have still prewar protective painting and marking. The fabric skin on the fuselage and wings is painted with AII green for uppersurfaces and AII light blue for undersurfaces while metal parts seems to be painted with A-19f gloss green and A-18f gloss light blue alkyd paints.
However White 404 has added irregular stripes and blotches of the lighter color, probably light brown.
The red star, although the little one, painted on the tail according to the actual NKAP and the number already painted on the side of the fuselage, suggest that the red stars on the upperwings were deleted.