WWII American Maritime Patrol Aircraft
In April 1938, a British purchasing commission arrived in the United States in search of a maritime patrol aircraft. Lockheed quickly proposed adapting its Model 14 Super Electra airliner, and in June 1938, Britain signed a contract for the first 200 aircraft, officially designated Hudson. After the United States entered World War II, a batch of 20 A-29 aircraft, the Lend-Lease version of one of the Lockheed Hudson Mk IIIA variants, originally intended for Britain, was transferred to the U.S. Navy. These aircraft received the designation PBO-1, following the traditional U.S. Navy system: PB stood for Patrol Bomber, O was the manufacturer code for Lockheed, and 1 indicated the first production variant.
The PBO-1 aircraft entered service with the U.S. Navy’s Patrol Squadron 82 (VP-82). The squadron was based at Naval Air Station Argentia in Newfoundland and was responsible for protecting convoy routes in the North Atlantic. A PBO-1 crew scored the first victory for U.S. naval aviation against the German submarine fleet. On March 1, 1942, a PBO-1 from VP-82, commanded by William Tepuni, spotted the German submarine U-656 off the coast of Newfoundland, successfully attacked it with depth charges, and sank it. This was the first confirmed sinking of a German submarine by a U.S. aircraft during World War II. Just two weeks later, on March 15, another VP-82 crew sank the submarine U-503. The successful operations of this relatively small group of PBO-1 aircraft paved the way for large-scale orders for land-based patrol aircraft of various types.