Hughes XP-73
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The Hughes Aircraft XP-73 was a temporary designation applied to the Hughes D-2 after the Material Command at Wright Field obtained approval to purchase "one Hughes DX-2 airplane in present commercial form as a prototype ..."1 Within three days the D-2 had been re-designation as the XA-37 for purposes of administering the contract. Howard Hughes decided not to sell the airplane to the Air Corps however, so that neither of the above Air Corps designations ever applied to any airplane.
Constructed from Duramold, the Hughes D-2 was developed by Howard Hughes as a high-speed, long-range aircraft with a configuration similar to that of the P-38 Lightning.
Hughes carried out testing of the D-2 at Harper Dry Lake in the Mojave Desert. The first flight was on 20 June 1943, and the aircraft was found to be unsatisfactory.
Plans were made to change the wings and modify the aircraft under the D-5 designation when the aircraft was destroyed in a mysterious hangar fire in November 1944.
[1] Case History of Hughes D-2, D-5, F-11 Project, Compiled by Historical Section Intelligence, Air Material Command, Wright Field, August 1946.
