Realair Spitfire IX MK959 2024-06-04

The aircraft started life with the RAF as MK959. Her first assignment was with 302 Squadron in 1944, flying a number of combat missions with the unit coded as WX-F before her last flight with them on May 30th, 1944. Then, the Spitfire then moved on to 329 Squadron, flying her first sortie with the unit over the Normandy beachhead on June 17th, 1944. She currently wears the same codes (5A-K) and invasion stripes she flew with 329 Squadron during this time. After the war she joined the reconstituted Royal Netherlands Air Force in September 1946, and again saw action with the 322 Squadron over the Dutch East Indies during the Indonesian fight for independence. Afterwards, the Dutch patched her up and used her as a decoy mounted atop a pole in Eindhoven- until the Dutch Spitfire Flight took her down in the early 1990s. They sold the Spitfire to Houston Texas in 1995, and spent the next decade restoring her back to flying condition. NX959RT's first post-restoration flight was in February 2004.