IN the darkest days of World War II, a fighter pilot took to the air. He never came home. Seventy years later, his aircraft has been declared the "Tutankhamun's tomb" of aviation history.

It was 1942. Germany's ace general, Rommel, was steamrollering across the Mediterranean. Britain was yet again on the backfoot.

British Flight Sergeant Dennis Copling was tasked with what seemed to be a routine mission - returning a damaged P-40 Kittyhawk fighter to an Egyptian repair base safely behind friendly lines.

He was never seen again.

Seventy years later, the near perfectly preserved remains of his aircraft were discovered sitting in the dust of the Sahara desert. Now, the aircraft has been recovered and is safely tucked away in a secure hangar - awaiting the outcome of negotiations to be returned to Britain to become the centre of a new memorial display.

Its epic story of struggle and disaster spans generations.

An oil worker stumbled across the sandblasted remains while surveying part of the Western Desert late last year.

It is 400km from the nearest town, apparently crash-landed - but largely intact - on a rocky outcrop.

Alongside were the remains of a makeshift shelter, a ramshackle construction consisting of the pilot's parachute, a few panels and piled rocks.

The pilot likely set out on foot in a desperate bid for safety.

How the Kittyhawk ended up so far off course is uncertain.

It is riddled with bullet holes: But were they the result of a fresh action, or the earlier action which caused the aircraft to set off for repairs?

Whatever the case, the pilot ended up far, far off course.

Likely on the last dregs of fuel, he attempted a landing on the featureless Sahara desert below.

It was not a perfect landing: The buckled propeller and landing gear were found nearby.

But getting the plane down in largely one piece was a good job, given the boulder-strewed landscape.

Flight Sergeant Copling never made it to safety.

Human remains have been found several kilometres from the downed aircraft. But it has not yet been established if these belong to the lost pilot.

But the aircraft he so carefully brought down is now a time capsule to a phase of World War II largely lost in the sands of time.

Battles continue to surround the wartime relic.

The yearlong struggle to recover the fighter unfolded amid Egypt's tumultuous civil unrest which has seen many museums and archaeological sites looted and destroyed.

The Kittyhawk has - at last - emerged the victor.

Now, the relic has been recovered and is safely tucked away in a secure hangar. Aviation enthusiasts have declared the find as significant as Tutankhamun's tomb for its untouched quality.

The Royal Air Force Museum is in the midst of negotiating through the British Embassy in Cairo the return of the iconic fighter to become a central feature of its London display.

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