Aircraft excavation

[GoonerChris]

I'm into all this sort of thing. I would like nothing more than getting involved in a 'dig' of this kind. Very interesting and emotive stuff.

I've seen the excavated aircraft of a gentleman from the Luftwaffe, Ulrich Steinhilper, which is housed at the Battle of Britain Musuem at Hawkinge. It resided in fields near Chislet, Canterbury until dug up back in the '70's. Ulrich was there to see it come out of the ground. This aircraft is also the subject of my BoB GB.

Anyhow, here is a link to the Time Team site with a brief description of how, what, when and why.

http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites...2000wierre.html

From here you can navigate to read about the excavation of the B-17 at Reedham Marshes and a couple of A-26's as well.

[OzH]

Gotta agree with you, facinating stuff.

I remeber watching this (or one very similar) on the Time Team, one of the guys just wandered round the edge of the field, picking bits out of the hedge, as the farmer had just chucked the bits there as he found them.

I remeber the other one on the B17 as well, all good stuff.

There was a show on last night where some Aussie's were looking for a P38, amazing how many were out there, mostley rotten through after 60+ years, but there are a lot of wrecks still around.

I remeber when I was a kid seeing a documentry about an American who wanted a Zero, he funded and lead an expedition to a remote Island and the footage I remeber was him trecking through jungle for a couple of days, finding an oldJapaneseairfield, all grown over, and walking down a row of aircraft, all in various states of decay.

He then picked one, his team then dismantled it, carried it back out of the jungle and had it shipped to the States. The program then followed his restoration job getting it back in the air (I seem to remeber one of the Mitsubishi family comeing over to help!).

Never seen it since, would love to watch it again if anyone knows of it

[Heraldcoupe]

Long before my time (I was born in 1967), a Vickers Wellington crashed within a mile of the house where I grew up. My dad used to take me to the crash site where there were still plenty of fragments to be found. I had lots of oddments, including a cylinder from one of the engines and some small pieces of geodetic structure. All sadly thrown away by my parents during subsequent clearouts.....

The story behind the aircraft was quite intriguing. The crew were thoroughly lost when they baled out, they were actually over the Welsh valleys. Some of the crew were hiding out in bushes when they overheard local miners talking on their way to work in the morning, hearing the Welsh language being spoken, they assumed they were in mainland Europe and were destined to spend the rest of the war in a POW camp!

I'd like to find out more about the aircraft in question, but none of the locals has been able to give me even a rough date for the loss of this one. Contact with some historians hasn't shed any light on the crash site, it seems largely un-recognised, despite local talk that the site was excavated in the 1980s or 90s. Any suggestions?

Cheers,

Bill.

[Test Graham]

Try the RAF Commands site, but with rather more information on the location of the site.

[Heraldcoupe]

Try the RAF Commands site, but with rather more information on the location of the site.

I think it was through that site I was given some references to documented Wellington sites, but none of these was closer than about 15 miles from the site I used to visit. I was able to give an approximate map reference, so there was no ambiguity in the location. It was a few years ago that I made any efforts in this area, so I may be wrong about who I did and didn't contact - I will have the emails archived somewhere.

I'll make an effort to do some deeper research,

Cheers,

Bill.

[Smiffy]

Yeah I find this sorta stuff facinating.

A couple of years back, we found out that the Robertsbridge aviation society had excavated the remains of one of my Grandfathers Lancs.

I really wish I'd known about it at the time, I would've loved to have helped with the dig ( I do think it would have been a very emotional experience for me and I'm fairly sure my stiff upper lip may have quivered just a bit ).

They recovered loads of bits, including all four engines.

If I get the chance I'll post some pics up.

[AndyL]

Amazing what's still out there - picked this out of a Spitfire IX site some years back...

[Tango India Mike]

Not exactly wreck recovery, but many years ago I met a bloke who said he had a Spitfire windscreen in his garage and wanted to get rid of it, so (with a liberal dose of scepticism) I said I'd have a look. Imagine my surprise when it turned out indeed to be a Spitfire windscreen, and in remarkably good condition too! I got it from him for $50! You can see it in my avatar, attached to a mock-up I built around it. Eventually it was donated to a worthy cause and nowadays flies securely bolted to the airworthy Mark VIII operated at Temora.

Here's another look at it . . .

The artwork's a bit fanciful, but hey . . . I was young then!

[dylan the rabbit]

This aircraft is also the subject of my BoB GB.

As Edgar so eloquently put it, isn't it difficult trying to find information on the markings on a plane that crashed into the ground at 400mph!

[GoonerChris]

As Edgar so eloquently put it, isn't it difficult trying to find information on the markings on a plane that crashed into the ground at 400mph!

Yes it is and I only have a couple of Ulrich's own photos and what I saw quickly in an Osprey book about the squadron as reference. The rest will be artistic licence!