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Author Topic: Finding Lost Aircraft  (Read 3794 times)

Ric Gillespie

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Finding Lost Aircraft
« on: November 18, 2019, 10:26:43 AM »

How many lost aircraft, whether on land or underwater, have been found as a result of someone assembling historical information, developing a hypothesis, and then conducting search?  My impression is most, if not all, have been found by following up on an accidental discovery.  Can we think of an example of a successful search like the one we are conducting - or are we attempting something that has never been done?
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Randy Jacobson

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #1 on: November 19, 2019, 06:24:39 AM »

There was the aircraft lost from Brazil to France about a decade or so ago that was found in the Central Atlantic with contemporaneous (historical?) data, as well as the Malaysian aircraft (yet to be found).  An aircraft lost about 1998 was found off of Newfoundland via underwater LIDAR techniques within a year after it was lost.  The infamous Swamp Ghost is perhaps a better example of a wreck found long ago by searching for it via historical records and anecdotal reports.  What about the Greenland wreck that was attempted to be rehabilitated and to be flown out only to have it burn upon take-off?

I presume from your question is more towards historical wrecks rather than NTSB-related (or more recent losses). 
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #2 on: November 19, 2019, 07:25:58 AM »

There was the aircraft lost from Brazil to France about a decade or so ago that was found in the Central Atlantic with contemporaneous (historical?) data,

You're talking about Air France 447 lost June 1, 2009.  A fairly specific location for the loss was known and yet it took almost two years to find the wreckage.
"The Brazilian Navy removed the first major wreckage and two bodies from the sea within five days of the accident, but the initial investigation by France's Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses pour la Sécurité de l'Aviation Civile (BEA) was hampered because the aircraft's flight recorders were not recovered from the ocean floor until May 2011, nearly two years later."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447


as well as the Malaysian aircraft (yet to be found).

MH370. No known general location.  Extensive searches have been unsuccessful.

  An aircraft lost about 1998 was found off of Newfoundland via underwater LIDAR techniques within a year after it was lost.

I'm not familiar with that one.  I presume the general location was known.

  The infamous Swamp Ghost is perhaps a better example of a wreck found long ago by searching for it via historical records and anecdotal reports.

Nope. I'm very familiar with that one.  B-I7E 41-2446 was initially discovered by accident in 1972 by the crew of an RAAF CH-47 Chinook on a routine mission.

  What about the Greenland wreck that was attempted to be rehabilitated and to be flown out only to have it burn upon take-off?

The B-29 "Kee Bird" was a well known wreck long before Darrel Greenameyer launched his ill-advised recovery project.  Nobody tracked it down based on historical records.

I presume from your question is more towards historical wrecks rather than NTSB-related (or more recent losses).

Even in the case of more recent losses, unless a specific location is known, searches are unsuccessful.  The best example is probably Steve Fossett whose light aircraft disappeared September 3, 2007.  The general location was known but extensive searches were unsuccessful.   "In September 2008, a hiker found Fossett's identification cards in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, leading shortly after to the discovery of the plane's wreckage."  Another example of found-by-accident.

This past summer, the Air & Sea Heritage Foundation hired Ballard's E/V Nautilus to search for the wreckage of the Sikorsky S-42B Samoan Clipper that went down off American Samoa in 1938.  An analysis of historical records suggested a fairly specific area, but two weeks of searching found nothing.

The discovery of Antoine de St. Exupery's P-38 is an interesting case. A diver came across the wreck in the late 1980s and thought it was a German aircraft, but was not able to identify it and gave up.  Then in 1998, a French fisherman pulled up a silver bracelet belonging to St. Expuery which revived the diver's investigation which ultimately resulted in th identification of the wreck as St. Exupery's aircraft..
https://www.argunners.com/discovery-of-antoine-de-saint-exuperys-p-38-lightning-the-story-behind-it/

I'm still not aware of anyone successfully doing what we're trying to do.
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Matt Revington

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #3 on: November 19, 2019, 08:58:48 AM »

There is the case of the Lost Squadron in Greenland

https://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a22575917/wwii-p-38-discovered-under-300-feet-of-ice-in-greenland/

These were not totally lost as the crews were rescued within a few days but the planes were then lost for more than 50 years under snow on shifting glacial ice.  The searchers had to guess at an initial location then figure out how the aircraft likely moved over time and then run expeditions to scan the ice with GPR and finally to drill into the ice to confirm that the radar object was the planes.
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Leon R White

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #4 on: November 19, 2019, 10:12:43 AM »

is the difference "looking for the aircraft/wreckage" vs. "looking for the location of the aircraft?"  The south american british bomber turned commercial craft was lost in the late 40's and the location was never found.  Then wreckage was found (gruesome) and then parts of the plane were/are being found. (I believe the plane was called "Stardust?")
Ballard made a useful comment after Titanic. He said something to the effect that he was a grid guy, not researcher.
Glen Miller's wreck won't be a 'looking for the location' effort as much as a 'find the wreckage' effort, but the two do seem to overlap.  I can't find any research search like TIGHAR's so far.
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Leon R White

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #5 on: November 19, 2019, 10:15:46 AM »

There is one search I wish some one would undertake.  A female WAAF flying a p 51 from Northrup to palm springs during WWII.  "Lost."  Like the White Bird, there are some misc comments about what people might have seen, but the pilot remains the only WAAF pilot never recovered.  If I remember correctly.
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Karen Hoy

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #6 on: November 19, 2019, 01:02:04 PM »

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947_BSAA_Avro_Lancastrian_Star_Dust_accident

The first Stardust wreckage was found in 1998 by mountain climbers.

http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1453dfca.html
https://aircraftwrecks.com/gts/gts.htm

There have been sporadic searches for Gertrude Vreeland Tompkins Silver and the missing P-51. Nothing found yet.

LTM,
Karen Hoy #2610CER
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Andrew M McKenna

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #7 on: November 19, 2019, 01:36:49 PM »

How about our own work to locate the L-10 Electra in Idaho?  It was Bill Carter's archival work that isolated the likely location, and when we went there it only took us 30 minutes to find the site. 

Unfortunately, most of it appeared to have been salvaged in years prior, so we weren't the first, but we didn't know that at the time.

amck
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Randy Jacobson

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #8 on: November 19, 2019, 05:24:38 PM »

I was thinking of Swiss Air 111, but it's downed location was fairly well known.

What about the wreck of Kingsford Smith in the Andaman Sea?  I know wreckage was found washed ashore, but I don't know the details of further investigations as to where to search/find the wreck, but most searches have come up empty (or at least without "proof"). 
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James Champion

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #9 on: November 19, 2019, 06:25:04 PM »

Dozen of WWII aircraft have been retrieved from Lake Michigan the past 30 years. The recently published book (2019) titled "The Great Navy Birds of Lake Michigan" by Taras Lyssenko has a lot about the research of the ships logs of the two ships converted into 'carriers' - the USS Wolverine and USS Sable. Lots of nice color pictures of recoveries. Sometimes the data for location comes from the logs of other ships. The logs are not always perfect, but usually have a time of aircraft loss, and ships position based on bearings to other ships or visible landmarks.  There does not seem to be a lot of detail hypothesis needed for a successful search outcome. Still, eventually, a lot of mowing-the-lawn sidescan work, sometimes over several seasons is required to find a particular plane. Plane recoveries run from between 60 feet to less than 500 feet underwater. Book also covers the finds of other items in Lake Michigan - historic ships, a Holocene forest, and --- a WWI German Submarine???!!!

Some issues are covered that are of the technical nature frequently discussed in this forum. Each type of aircraft has its own issues with recovery. Wildcats have magnesium engine mounts so engines detach from the aircraft over time and have to be recovered separately.  Wildcats have something in their shape that seems to cause them, as they 'fly' or 'flutter' underwater to almost always end up inverted on the bottom.
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Matt Revington

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Re: Finding Lost Aircraft
« Reply #10 on: November 22, 2019, 11:59:49 AM »

Project Recover has had some success tracking down crash sites of WWII US aircraft and repatriating any recovered remains.  Its not quite searches like the one for Earhart or th L'oiseau Blanc but they are doing archival research to locate likely areas where losses occurred and then going out and doing surveys of the areas and finally dives etc to confirm.  The one at the link below is the story of finding of a B24 named Heaven Can Wait

https://www.projectrecover.org/project-recover-locates-wwii-b-24-heaven-can-wait/
« Last Edit: November 22, 2019, 12:35:33 PM by Matt Revington »
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