Hidden warbirds II : more epic stories of finding, recovering, and rebuilding WWII's lost aircraft

309 Pages·2014·11.57 MB·English

by  Veronico

HIDDEN WARBIRDS II
More Epic Stories of Finding,
Recovering, and Rebuilding
WWII’s Lost Aircraft
Nicholas A. Veronico

Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction: They’re Still Out There…
Part One: What Historic Aircraft Do the Waters Hold?
Battle of Britain: Do-17 Recovery
Bringing Up a Birdcage Corsair
Ju-88 U4+TK Recovery and Restoration
Dyke Lake B-17 Recovery
Lend-Lease P-39 Restoration
Part Two: In from the Swamps and Jungles
Thunderbolt in a Swamp
Sole Surviving Brewster F3A-1 Corsair
Recovering the Sandbar Mitchell
Australian Outback P-40 over the Wine Country
Part Three: Lucky Finds: Rare Warbirds in Unusual Places
Return of a Uruguayan Air Force Mustang
Hawker Tempest II Restoration in Texas
Where Did All the B-24 Liberators Go?
Hidden in Plain Sight: Mustangs on Poles
World War II Privateer Survived as a Firebomber
Epilogue: What Does the Future Hold?
Bibliography and Suggested Reading
Index
Acknowledgments
Hidden Warbirds II is a celebration of those who locate, recover, and restore lost
World War II warbirds and the men and women who flew them during the war.
More than seventy years have passed since the beginning of the first truly global
war in which thousands of aircraft were built, flown, and fought in aerial
battlefields the world over. When the war ended, many aircraft were abandoned
or unaccounted for, and many have been returned and restored.
Documenting the stories of these aircraft and those involved requires the
generosity of many people. And to them, I owe a debt of gratitude and extend
my thanks to: Ian Abbott; Carlos Abella; Mark R. Allen; Bill Allmon; Peter
Arnold; Jim Azelton; Rebecca Azelton; Brian Baker; Gerald Balzer; Caroline
and Ray Bingham; Bruce Brockhagen; Don Brooks; Roger Cain; Patrick Carry
and Christopher Johnson; James Carter and Karl von Moller—Broken Wings;
Tom Camp; Wayne Cook; Lex Crawley; Charles Darby; Ed Davies; John Davis;
Robert F. Dorr; Bill Dunbar; Doug Kirby; Shelley Ragsdale; Paul Schumacher;
Drannon Vines—National Naval Aviation Museum; Jim Dunn; Ann Y. Evans;
Chad Ezell; Nelson Ezell; Randy Ferris; Guttorm Fjeldstad; Curtis Fowles; Craig
Fuller—Aviation Archaeological Investigation and Research; Chuck Geise; Erik
Gilg—and the staff at Zenith Books; Wayne Gomes; Cory Graff; Kevin
Grantham; Woody Grantham; Todd Hackbarth; Dan Hagedorn; Alice Hendricks;
Hélio Higuchi; Ted Holgerson—California Airframe Parts; Frederick Johnsen;
Vallarie Kilkenney-Jukes and Norm Jukes; Larry Kotz; Robert Kropp; Dr. Gary
Kuhn; Martin Kyburz; Christer Landberg; Tillie and William T. Larkins; Jim
Larsen; Dave Leininger; Gerry Liang; Roger Mecca; Dale Messimer; Robert
Mester; Patrick Mihalek; Chris Miller; John Muszala and John Muszala II; Anne
Murata and James Koivunen—Pacific Aviation Museum Pearl Harbor; Robert
Nishimura; Michael O’Leary; Mike Oliver—Tillamook Air Museum; Allan
Olson and Taras Lyssenko—A. and T. Recovery; Milo Peltzer; Jakub Perka;
Dick Phillips; Tyler Pinkerton; Chris Prevost and Sheryl Carlucci; Paul Quinn;
Taigh Ramey—Vintage Aircraft; Scott Rose, editor of the Warbird Information
Exchange (WIX) as well as many WIXers; Lee Scales; Pat Scannon; Doug
Scroggins; Joe Shoen; Jim Slattery; Scott Slocum; Robert Smith; Ajay
Srivastava and Michelle Morgans—RAF Museum; Bill Stanczak, Ron Strong;
Scott Thompson; Dave Trojan; Rick Turner; Anders Utgaard; Mike
Vadeboncoeur—Midwest Aero; Richard VanderMeulen; Paul Varga; Armand
and Karen Veronico; Betty Veronico; Tony Veronico; Mike Walton; Mark Watt;
Dan F. Webb; Tom Wilson; and Christen Wright.
With great appreciation.
Nicholas A. Veronico
San Carlos, California
Introduction
They’re Still Out There…

Flight Sergeant Dennis Copping belly-landed RAF Kittyhawk ET574 on June 28, 1942, two
hundred miles from the nearest settlement in Egypt. Copping was listed as missing in action and
his aircraft was not found until Jakub Perka stumbled across it seventy years later. The aircraft is
a time capsule and is nearly complete. This aircraft has been recovered by the RAF Museum and
is now in storage. Jakub Perka
Today, nearly seventy years after the end of World War II, there is a strong
movement to find, restore, and fly aircraft from that conflict. It is one thing to
see a Messerschmitt Bf 109, a North American Aviation P-51 Mustang, or a
Supermarine Spitfire sitting in a museum, but it is another sensory experience to
hear the roar of a Rolls-Royce Merlin or Daimler-Benz engine as it pulls a
fighter through the air at speeds approaching 400 mph. The sound is heard and
the engine’s vibrations are felt, depending upon where one stands, and the
auditory sensations of the aircraft and its engine bring history to life.
It is the sights and sounds of warbirds of all types that have made the flying
airshow so popular. All of today’s warbird airshows owe their existence to the
National Air Races, held at Cleveland, Ohio, before and after World War II. In
fact, the warbird movement as a whole owes a debt to the National Air Races.
The war in Europe officially ended on May 7, 1945, punctuated by Adolf
Hitler’s suicide on April 30, 1945. The Japanese surrendered unconditionally to
Allied Forces on September 2, 1945, after two atomic bombs were dropped on
its cities (Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9, 1945), ending the
conflict. In January 1946, as servicemen and women were still in the process of
returning from duty overseas, it was announced that the National Air Races
would return to Cleveland, Ohio, in September of that year.
Servicemen and women had flown aircraft much faster than those that had
competed in the pre-war National Air Races, and the most competitive of the ex-
military pilots made their way to aircraft surplus yards around the county to
secure an aircraft capable of winning the races. The women, most former
Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs), would compete in the Halle Trophy
races, sponsored by Halle department stores. The Halle Trophy Race for women
was confined to AT-6/SNJ-type aircraft and consisted of five laps of a fifteen-
mile course, or seventy-five miles. Men and women could also compete in the
Bendix “R” Division, a cross-country speed dash or any of the various closed-
course trophy races. For the cross-country and closed-course races, competitors
brought a variety of war-surplus P-38 Lightnings, P-51As, Bs, Cs, and Ds, along
with a number of Bell P-39 Airacobras and P-63 Kingcobras.
Because of their value, everyone is keeping an eye out for hidden warbirds. This infrared sensor
photo shows a Hawker Fury in Iraq in 2011. Note the five-blade propeller and detached outer wing
panels. If it could be exported, it would be worth more than $300,000 as is once it reached the
United States or United Kingdom. Tony Veronico
Seeing the former combatants competing for prize money enthralled the
general public, giving them a sense of what these aircraft did in the skies above
Europe and the Pacific. When the U.S. Navy fielded an aerial demonstration
team of its own, the Blue Angels, flying first Grumman F6F Hellcats and later
F8F Bearcats, they became one of the biggest draws at aviation events around
the country. Airshows were front-page news and the flyers who put these war-
surplus airplanes through their paces were treated like celebrities. Keep in mind
that the Wright Brothers had flown less than fifty years prior and Charles
“Lucky Lindy” Lindbergh’s solo transatlantic flight had occurred less than two
“Lucky Lindy” Lindbergh’s solo transatlantic flight had occurred less than two
decades before.
If the glamorous air races and post-war employment of a number of surplus
World War II aircraft types was the first era of the warbird movement, the
second era, essentially from 1950 to 1964, was not so kind. Bombers, fighters,
and trainers that had managed to escape the scrappers’ torch now sat on airfields
across the country, most neglected, too expensive to maintain, or because the
owners simply lost interest. The Korean War and the jet age had snuffed out the
romance of World War II flight and the escapades of its aircrews. As derelict
warbirds gathered dirt and bird droppings across the United States, a small cadre
of forward-thinking individuals began to buy up, take home, and rescue a
number of ex-World War II warbirds. Simultaneously, the last of the World War
II types in the American air arsenal’s inventory were being sold off—P-51s went
at auction at McClellan AFB, California, and Bearcats, Corsair, Hellcats,
Tigercats, and many others were sold surplus at the Navy’s storage pool at
Litchfield Park, Arizona. Some of the aircraft acquired from these surplus stocks
went south of the border only to re-emerge decades later to fuel the warbird
movement in the 1970s and 1980s, and others flew aerial mapping missions or
attempted to change the weather, flying cloud-seeding missions.
Sonar image of the Grumman F6F Hellcat discovered in 185 feet of water off the coast of Jupiter,
Florida. Researchers from OceanGate Inc., were testing a new submersible fitted with 2D and 3D