Nakajima Ki-43-IIIa Hayabusa "Oscar"

Here's a photo I forgot I had.

It is yours truly with a Nakajima Ki-43-IIIa Hayabusa "Oscar" reproduction at the Seattle Museum of Flight. The photo was taken in 2005 when I went up to Seattle, Washington to visit friends.

According to the Imperial Japanese Aviation Resource Center:

The Ki-43 was the single most numerous fighter operated by the Imperial Japanese Army. Comparable to the A6M Zero-Sen, the Ki-43 was highly manueverable but fragile and tended to disintegrate when hit by .50 rounds. Later versions had some armor and self-sealing fuel tanks but all models suffered from a lightweight armament (though the IIIb tried to rectify this). The Ki-43 was popular with pilots and was the mount of a majority of the Japanese army aces. Unfortunately it was kept in production long after it was obsolete.