Look what shifting wind and tides have revealed – in Wales:
Sixty-five years after it ran out of gas and crash-landed on a beach in Wales, an American P-38 fighter plane has emerged from the surf and sand where it lay buried — a World War II relic long forgotten by the U.S. government and unknown to the British public.
During those decades, beach strollers, sunbathers and swimmers were often within a few yards of the aircraft, utterly unaware of its existence just under the sand. Only this past summer did it suddenly reappear due to unusual conditions that caused the sands to shift and erode.
The startling revelation of the Lockheed “Lightning” fighter, with its distinctive twin-boom design, has stirred considerable interest in British aviation circles and among officials of the country’s aircraft museums, ready to reclaim yet another artifact from history’s greatest armed conflict.
The pilot, 24-year old 2LT Robert Elliot of Rich Square, NC, survived the controlled crash uninjured, only to go missing when he was shot down over Tunisia – neither his body nor the plane he was flying has ever been found.
Bad luck.
Amazing…
P-61. No way a Lightning.
Was looking for other things on the NAS Sig website a couple of days ago and saw they pulled up a Corsair out of the bay in August (or there abouts).
Wonder what else global warming will uncover. Could be exciting days ahead!
Shipmate,
It is indeed a P-38. The fok\lks who found it recovered the serial numbers and traced it back. It’s the earliest model lightening in existence. It’s also how they found out who the pilot was, etc.
Amazing indeed.
The wing’s aspect ratio looks to me more like a P-38 than a P-61, a Black Widow’s wing should look a bit stubbier. The P-38 had a 52 ft wingspan, the P-61 was 66 ft. If one of the sightseers would just lie down in the sand for us…
What’s left of the fuselage looks more egg-shaped than the P-61 ought to, too, though it’s hard to tell for sure.
I’m betting a Guiness this serial number is flying within the next 10 years, even if the only thing the saltwater hasn’t rendered unusable is that serial number.
And when I think of the thousands of perfectly good aircraft we cut up after the war, I shudder at how disposable we think our history.
– Max
Early Model P-38. Probably an F or G Model. Prettier engine nacelles than the later H thru J models. Can’t tell from the photo but I suspect since the pilot was transferred to North Africa with his Group then he may have been in the 1st or 20th Fighter Group and indeed an early P38. Just guessing. I am just a wealth of useless knowledge.
Wow.
THIS P-38 SHOULD BE RETURNED TO THE U.S.—IT IS OUR PAST HISTORY.
This P-38 was supposedly dated as 1941 manufacture. If so, it predates the F and G’s and is likely a D or E model. Not only earliest Lightning in existence, but possibly the earliest combat aircraft of the 8th Air Force in existence. What a find!
Oh, yeah, GEO, didn’t the early Allisons have planetary reduction gears?
Ah, Bill, it’s an Army airplane, not a Navy one. The rules are different.
Bob Ballard and his ilk have managed to get into Federal law the proposition that anything that ever belonged to the United States Navy, or any other navy, is forever Special and Sacred, and you may not salvage it from the bottom of the sea, even if it was deliberately tipped over the side as abandoned trash.
(Going against about a thousand years’ worth of Admiralty Law.)
The USAF’s position on wrecks has always been, “Hey, we abandoned it, good luck, knock yerself out, please send pix after you restore it!”
I think the USN is a bit mental on this subject, not because of possible disturbance of war graves, but because of, e.g., an A-4 with a JG in it and a nuke under it, still missing somewhere on the sea bottom
TIGHAR, the aviation archaeology group that surveyed the wreck, says the aircraft is “presumed to be” 41-7677. Baugher lists 41-7677 as a P-38F-1-LO. Presumably, then, this aircraft is slightly newer than the famous Glacier Girl, 41-7630, also a P-38F-1-LO. A neat find regardless – you just never know what you might stumble over out there.
I feel vindicated. Actually I was basing the model off of the type that went to the UK in those two fighter groups and subsequently to North Africa.
P-61? Idiot. Definetely P-38. 61 would be way bigger, plus the cockpits in the wrong place, plus a bunch of other things. The engines, wings, etc. F or G model? …Nah! Older. I say E, or even D. Flypast magazine says its one of the oldest P-38s still in existance. Even though my expertice is early jets, I still know alot about the ol’ warbirds. Let me check some images……….. Well, I’ve looked for 20 minutes, and it is an E or F. Not G, not D. F. So here’s what I know:
Plane: P-38
Manufacturer: Lockheed Aircraft Co.
Year Built: 1941
Model: “F”
Crashed: September 27th, 1942
Serial Numer: 41-7677
Pilot: 2nd Lt. Frederick Elliot
Country: US
Branch: USAAF
Location: Wales
Squadron: 49th Squadron
Group: 14th Fighter Group
So with that knowledge, it will hopefully be recovered in the spring on ‘08 as planned.
March On!
-The Jungle N