Thank you Professor!! My Grandpa built P 38's at Lockheed's Burbank plant in Southern Calif. There's a good chance that he had a hand in that plane's production! He was always proud of the Lightning and that he built them! And we were proud of him!
They did a helluva job on this airframe. Think of the strength it took to withstand 70+ years of wings full of sand and seawater, yet hold together like that.
@@kmmediafactory Negative. QUANTITY beat the Nazis, NOT quality. Our hardware was made to last just long enough to get the job done. Generally re German hardware, one of many reasons they lost was they over engineered everything. 🇺🇸
My sister in law has a grandfather who flew P38’s in the war. Shot down in September of 1944 over Holland he was a POW for about 9 months until his camp, Stalog Luft 1 was liberated by the Red army. An amateur historian in Holland has located and been digging up pieces of his crashed airplane in a farm in Holland. The pilot celebrates his one hundredth birthday this coming Sunday.
Every so often there are U.S. Navy fighters found in Lake Michigan in America. A lot of pilots trained how to take off and land there during WW2 on a modified ship of some sort that was not a real Navy Aircraft Carrier. Some have been removed from the lake over the years but there haven't been any lately.
The modified ship to which you refer was a side wheel steamer offering overnight passage in the days before bridges. I don’t recall the names ( there were 2, one I think was Wolverine) were converted to “-aircraft carriers “. They could only make 20 knots, so the winds of the lake had to suffice adding to tricky take off and landings ! There is a Great TH-cam video about these.
While stationed at Marine Corps air Station Cherry point North Carolina we had wheel watch at the end of the runways! Not always. Sometimes, suppose with new pilots or whatever! Just to make sure their gear was down.
The guy who identified the aircraft from a picture of the wing tip reminds me of a brake shop experience I had as a teenager ( now 60). I took in my rotors and told him "I need these turned, and also brake pads for a ---" he interrupted with "1970 Caprice, I can tell from the rotors." I'm still impressed in the knowledge and expertise of that man. Since that day, when I need brake service, I've never even stepped foot in a different shop.
I was looking for bolts for some discs I'd bought for a friend's Transit. I walked into the local agricultural engineers with one disc and the bloke said "Ford Transit. The bolts don't fit, right?" He'd been there and done it.
I think I can compete. In the early 1990's I walked into a large auto parts store in N. California with a random casting from a 1952 John Deere 420c (not a common tractor), and the cashier says "Oh, John Deere 420....I used to make those!" The factory was in the mid-west. Smh.
There's a Lancaster in Pegwell Bay, just out from the Royal St. George Golf Club at Sandwich, Kent. I believe the aircraft was shot up over Germany and didn't quite make it back into Manston. In the early 60s it was exposed at low tide and an RAF Westland Whirlwind was photographed in the local paper dropping a man onto the wing.
What a fantastic video! My grandfather was a soldier with Patton's 3rd Army in Europe during the war. He grew up fascinated by planes and originally tried to enlist in the Army Air Corps, but was found to be color blind and ended up in a Chemical Mortar Battalion. He liked to tell the story of being in combat one day and seeing the unmistakable outline of a P38 engaged in a dogfight at low altitude with another plane overhead. Gunfire on the ground seemed to stop momentarily as soldiers looked up from their fox holes to watch the fight as those two dueled it out. Coincidentally, today would have been his 97th birthday. I miss him dearly and cherish those WWII stories he told and love it, Mark, when one of your videos mentions something he was connected to in some way.
When you mentioned the pilot was towing a target, it reminded me of a story my father told me about during WWII in the Royal Navy he too was firing at a target being towed by an American pilot. The American pilot radioed down saying “Remind those Limeys I’m pulling this target not pushing it”
Years ago a kid was digging in the sand at the beach I lived at (Ocean Isle, NC) and found a P-47 that had set down after running out of gas on anti submarine patrol. I went to see them haul it out of the sand, the paint was largely intact and you could still see the star and bars insignia. I remember a man standing next to me saying "man, look at that thing, I wonder if they'll ever even know what it was?" I looked down and there was a big yellow cylinder. Painted on it was "bottle, cockpit oxygen" with about a paragraph of manufacturer and part number info. I just kinda looked over at the guy.
During an after war display, outside the coast of Copenhagen, a Blohm and Voss, German flying boat was shot at by English planes and sunk. And during the planning and built of the new tunnel and bridge to Sweden the wreck was re-found and a group of specially educated divers took it up and it is now being rebuilt at The Danish Technical Museum in Elsinore/Helsingør: Sadly, we had several of those German planes left when the war ended, but none is saved today.
As a descendant of one of the ground floor Lockheed aircraft design group it's just amazes me how resilient that airframe really is . Amazing pride in workmanship at that Burbank factory! when made in America meant ending tyranny ...
My grandpa worked at the Lockheed Skunk Works. He couldn’t talk about his work but he dropped a few hints that in hindsight make me think he was working on stealth technology. One day my grandmother found his lawnmower abandoned in the middle of mowing the lawn. She freaked out and called my dad saying she thought the Russians might have abducted him. My dad drove over there and found him drinking beer in a neighbor’s backyard. Lol
It's just like the Airacobras that landed on tidal beach flats in far northern Qld. A group of aircraft got lost on a mission or training and ran low on fuel and landed where they could. The aircraft were unrecoverable and decayed in the marine salt air on the tidal flats. The pilot crews were lucky to survive in such a remote location and were rescued. Better than being an impromptu meal for a salt water crocodile or a shark, or slowly staving to death with no local knowledge of local foods or bushcrafts.
Similar story to that P-40 found out in the desert at Al Wadi al Jadidi, Egypt in 2012. Flt Sgt Dennis Copping was ferrying the aircraft to a repair station, survived the landing and ventured off on his own never to be seen again. The closest town was 200 miles away.
I remember reading about that story many years ago - the Sunday paper at the time had colour pictures (!!!) of the wrecks. The nose sections were damaged when the military "safed" the ammunition stored there. Amazing to hear they're still there.
At least 2 have been recovered. 1 is in Mareeba at a Museum (Sid Beck museum) and another was being restored by a group who had it in a shed just south of Mossman (north of Cairns)
Years ago I visited the village of Mars in Papua where my father landed in 1944. Two miles away was a small island used as an airstrip by the army. On the airstrip were two P-38s stripped of their engines and guns. The locals used to go over and race the planes by pushing them down the runway.
Papua New Guinea was littered with wrecks for many decades after WW2. I worked in Port Moresby for 4 years in the mid 90's, and became slightly obsessed with wreck hunting and gained many records from the Australian War Memorial to aid us. We found 2 previously unknown wrecks in around 20 metres of water by scuba diving. Very smashed up. There's still a lot left - one famous salvage of the 2000's being known as Swamp Ghost. Great to hear you trekked out all the way there to see for yourself where your father was. Much respect to you
I use a system to generate all my passwords so I don't have to remember them. I can always figure them out. I recommend everyone come up with their own system. I can still access my old email account that I haven't used in 10 years.
Simply incredible.. It is almost as if mother nature is playing a game with us.. Allowing us to gain a peek at this historical treasure on a whim, only to cover it up again in order to preserve it until the day comes that someone can recover it and give it the respect deserved by such a beautiful design of the late, great Kelly Johnson.
My father's favourite airplane. He and my uncles and auntie used to wave to the Yanks flying out over the Lincolnshire coast. He said there was a Lighting pilot that always used to drop low and wave back, which for any child is really something, ( An experience we would recieve later from Harrier pilots ). Apparently there was a shiny green Spitfire that used do the same, but he came in so low the kids were hugging the sod, all they saw of it was it disappearing into the distance. I used to love listening to their stories of the war as children. One thing my dad could never do without was a tape with the drone of Merlin engines on it, it helped him sleep.
My next door neighbor was in the south Pacific during WWII as a radio operator. His only older brother was in the Pacific too and was a P-38 pilot. The older brother went out on a night mission and disappeared, no trace was ever found. The few times my neighbor talked about this tragedy it was obvious it was a crushing loss.
Thousands of aircraft with their crews, from all sides simply disappeared over water in WW2, most are probably in very deep waters so will never be found but some must be closer to land and might be discovered. Sadly they will now be disintegrating to the point where salvage is not a viable prospect but from an academic and human point of view it would be nice to finally be able to say what happened to the crews and where they were lost.
@Lawnmower American The US forces deemed many of the US operated or loaned aircraft in Australia uneconomical to repatriate, and many were dumped at sea off the Australian coast.
Awesome video as usual Mark. I had lunch with my 92 year old uncle and his brother in law at the Admiral Rodney Pub near Shrewsbury few weeks ago and the conversation turned to the war. They still remember riding their bicycles as children to watch the 8th Air Force p-38's leaving RAF Atcham to escort bomber missions into Germany.
The P-38 might have been the important fighter of the war, which is incredible give how much we all worship the Spitfire, P-51, etc. It is the only American fighter that was produced throughout the war, from Pearl to VJ Day, with over 10,000 produced. It was shockingly versatile and was good value as a long-range fighter, especially helpful in the Pacific. The P-38 was the aircraft of America's top aces, Richard Bong (40 victories), Thomas McGuire (38 victories), and Charles H. MacDonald (27 victories). It could carry a heavy payload of bombs or rockets and was steadily improved throughout the war. While it didn't fare as well in Europe, and started to be overtaken by the P-51 as a air supremacy and bomber escort fighter, this machine absolutely helped us win the war and it deserves more respect than it seems to get.
From what I've read, they were a real mother to fly in combat, though. Very complicated. But, Yamamoto might have some thoughts on the matter. So it can't have been too bad.
This is utterly fascinating to see these old birds rotting away on the shoreline. Incidentally, when my great great uncle Archie, of the Canadian Army, was stationed over in the UK, the area he was in was met with over 20 air raids by the Luftwaffe, not too far, I think, from these old beaches.
The P38 is my favorite WW2 fighter. We infact have one in a local museum. It crashed on the Timpanogas Mountain Utah USA and has since been recovered and restored. There is even a rusted original part by it in the museum. Seeing this plane here makes me sad, I hope that in time it gets salvaged and restored for a museum just like the one I mentioned.
Thanks! Somewhere? In my brother's attic are photos my Dad took of the Surrender Bombers...in videos online of that day I've always wanted to see if I could find him by the camera angle. He always talked to us kids about how much he loved the P-38. Great video...I'm happy the found the old girl.
There's a Wellington that crashed near me, sadly 4 crew died. There's still parts of it up on the memorial in the moors. Apparently there were also another couple very near me too, another Wellington and a Lancaster. There's a Comet on a beach not too far away either, didn't expect to see that there.
A B-25 with full bomb load crashed into a hill near me and exploded. I found a piece of it’s fuselage underneath a hedge in the late 70’s. It’s displayed in a cabinet in my living room.
Summer of 78 I went into the domed church in Mosta Malta. There is a 500 pound bomb on display. The story goes that the church was filled with people during the heavy bombing period.The bomb crashed through the roof but didn't explode or hurt anyone.
As always, this was a fascinating video. Strangely enough, the body of water which has the most wrecked US WWII aircraft is Lake Michigan off the coast of Chicago. The US War and Navy Departments did not to train pilots on either the Atlantic or Pacific Coasts for fear of Axis attacks, so the Great Lakes were chosen for training pilots and carrier crews. Two old side-wheeled pleasure boats were converted into makeshift aircraft carriers, and Chicago's Navy Pier became the base to house the crews. (For a brief while, one of carrier trainees was my Dad, who was soon re-assigned to other posts, including Jacksonville, FL.). Most of the Navy Air Force pilots and carrier crews trained on Lake Michigan, including future president, George H.W. Bush. Though Lake Michigan's inland location made enemy attacks impossible, many training mishaps still occurred. Thankfully, few lives were lost (even in the brutal Midwest winters) as rescuers quickly recovered downed pilots. Still, many planes were lost and remain at the bottom of Lake Michigan, making it the most common place for WWII wrecks.
Live on the North Carolina coast. We have a boat that we use for island hopping & fishing. Last year, i found what i assumed was the keel of a blockade runner wreck on Bear Island. In 3 feet of surf at low tide, there were hundreds of long rusty bolts, minimal 2.5 feet long. The "keel" was about 60' long, and 18" wide. The bolts were in rows of 5, and the rows were about 1' center to center. The next time i came to the island, the sand had covered it. The park rangers were not interested.
I seem to recall a German WW2 bomber was found in the silt of the Humber estuary about 20 years ago and, similarly, another off the Tees. One of them had a skeletal crew member with tags intact.
Yes I think your right about that it had attacked the steelworks where I was an electrical technician at redcar tjat site is full of history sad day when it closed
I was never a fan of school left young long story short between you and the operations room i am slowly becoming a history nut the details and research that must go into these videos alone merit the upmost respect , fair play to you sir .
@@c0rnp0p80 that’s neat, got a tour of a restored PBY years ago. It was spacious for one man with a sleeping bag. My grandfather was one of only a handful of men to bail out of a P-38 and survive. It wasn’t an easy plane to jump from because of the tail assembly, your TAS had to be just right or you’d break your neck on the tail assembly.
@@CAP198462 that's crazy! Glad to hear he made it. My grandfather told me a funny story about the first time his crew practiced taking off and landing on water. One of the senior guys had a bunch of unsharpened pencils tied up in a rubber band. He asked him what that was for, and he told him he'd find out. Well, the first time they hit the water my grandfather said he heard a bunch of rivets popping out, and the guy with the pencils would take one out, plug it in the holes where the rivets popped out, and break them off. He said that would hold it until after they were done and the mechanics could fix them properly. And that's how the Navy did things back then lol.
I love these stories about ww2 aircraft being rediscovered after so long, I hope this particular aircraft eventually makes it's way into a museum and I'd also love to hear more stories about ww2 era vehicles.
This is indeed a treasure and needs to be preserved. My fear is that now this has been shown on TH-cam it will be plundered by metal detectors and sold off in little bits. Air shows used to be full of such stalls.
@@chris6559 Hi, Chris. It's hard to see clearly, but it looks like the guns might be missing. Since it landed in very shallow water (at the time), maybe the USAAF tried to recover some of the easier to extract items, like the guns and maybe the radio?
Yes but he does not list the facts. The p38 is a scheduled monument listed by the Welsh Government ‘CADW’. Scheduled monuments are rarely even touched let alone recovered.
Amazing story. A decades old wreck appears and reminds us of one guys ultimate sacrifice long ago in a foreign land far from his home for the freedom of people who never even knew of him. Makes me want to cry.
I know that the English side of the Solway Firth has some Hudson Bombers in the Estuary after training exercises went wrong. There is a wreck near Anthorn, sometimes you can see the tail fin. They used to call it Hudson Bay.
Fantastic Mark, this plane has to be salvaged ! As a Dutchman, I tend to think, how hard can it be ? Im sure there are some good Dutch company's that would love to do this job. We have some very active war rescue company's, very suitable for this kinda job. Im sure you know this already :) Im donating for this :)
Have a look at the Do17 pulled from the Thames a few years ago, it looked complete in situ, they ended pulling out a pile of fragile heavily corroded junk, despite their best efforts.
There's a real "forgotten" ww2 plane wreck on an island north of Cooktown, Queensland. On Low Wooded island, there's an A-20 Havoc that didn't officially exist. It was built from the remains of two written off aircraft. Based in New Guinea and dubbed "Steak and Eggs" the pilots used to use it to fly to Australia on unauthorised shopping trips to pick up supplies that were hard to get in New Guinea. Eventually it suffered a mechanical problem and crash landed on the island. It's in pieces now, and often little of it is visible, but sometimes the sand uncovers some large parts.
Hi Mark. Thanks for another great video. This particular one is of great interest because my parents moved to Harlech in 1995 and my Dad is still there, so we know the area well. In your film at 0:28 in the bottom of the top right hand third of the picture you can see part of a pine tree plantation. The woodland has been cleared extensively in recent years but about fifteen years ago my Wife and I discovered a massive embankment built with sandbags about 10-12 feet high, 15 feet wide and hundreds of yards long forming a continous structure which is roughly hourglass shape. This can be found on O.S. maps of the area. In one place a breach has been created to allow cattle to pass through. We originally thought it was an old sea defense structure but, it turns out it was actually an RAF air gunnery range. Since the pine forest has been cleared the the embankment is now clearly visible. It was built to support a narrow gauge railway line along which small locomotives hauled targets for air gunnery crews, located in the enclosed area formed by the embankment, to shoot at. This area is now however heavily overgrown with grass and bushes so it's difficult to work what if anything is still there. The facility was linked to the main West Coast Railway Line by a spur line located approximately one mile north of Harlech railway station. The remains of the embankment for this spur line and where it crosses the main A496 road can still be seen. Very little information can be found online about this gunnery range and I haven't been able to find any photographs of it from the war years. On one particular occasion though, we did found a large chunk part of a tank turret with the barrel mantlet half buried in the ground. So, there may be other artefacts still there. Keep up the great work.
There are certainly many undiscovered war wrecks, any where fighting occured. I just saw a cartoon video of a famous Russian fighter pilot, who went missing. A freind of hers looked for her wreckage, finding it som sixty years after the war. The pilot still in the wreck with a head wound. supposedly, many many wrecks were found. I have seen many videos of bunkers and weapons being found, also. Grim reminders.
Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak, also known as Lilya, was a fighter pilot in the Soviet Air Force during World War II. Historians estimate for her total victories range from five to twelve solo victories and two to four shared kills in her 66 combat sorties.
Makes me think about the various stories of brand new aircraft, sometimes even entire squadrons, still in their crates buried at various airfields around the world at the end of the war. Ahhh if only one of those stories bore fruit. Might make an interesting one for you to cover Mark?
Yeah, this remind of the 18 Spitfires? I presume, that were buried in Birma. They were wrapped in oil paper or cloth, and then burried. A few year ago they were found, so the story went, but I never heard from it again. I recall that it was the same year that Top Gear also went to Birma to do a special. I was convinced that they would visit the site were the planes were, but they didn't sadly. Maybe Mark can look into this again, it would be so awesome if these planes are found !
I always considered the P-51 to be the best-looking fighter of WW2, but IMO the P-38 was the COOLEST fighter of WW2. Such a unique airplane...and good-looking too in its own way.
Na. Mosquito is the most interesting. From design and manufacturing to operations. Some of its characteristics are incredible. Like carrying the same weight of bombs as a b17 with 2 engines?
The P-38 was a thing of technological and physical beauty. It was a tricky aircraft to fly. So many things to remember I had the opportunity to see one close up back when the Scatterbrain Kid (serial #: 43-50281) was being restored at Lafayette Regional Airport. Got to look inside the cockpit. Most noticable thing to me was the "steering wheel" rather than a control stick like there was in other fighters.
My Great Grandfather was in Britain during World War Two. He would often go out into fields and go to the remains of German bombers and planes shot down. He would pick up bits of Plexiglas or acrylic glass from the planes. At the time is was a very new and cool thing however I truly have no idea why he did it.
With the long lasting drought in the Western US, Lake Mead is drying up revealing many long lost treasures. Besides a newly found Higgins boat, a previously located B29 bomber is now becoming visible from the surface.
So interesting.... In my town, approximately 15 miles Northeast of Selfridge Air National Guard Base, Michigan, a P-38 crashed in a field near where my house is sometime in 1943. Selfridge was a major training base during WW2. My father, a teenager at the time, vividly remembered the P-38 crash, since it occurred near my great-grandfather's farm. The pilot was killed, and his parachute was found many miles from where his body fell after bailing out. Several years ago, a team of military archeologists found some of the parts of the P-38 that were buried in the ground due to the high speed impact of the crash. My father told me of several crashes in the area during the war, including a P-47 and a B-25. In most of the crashes, the aircrew were killed. Interesting video Mark - keep up the good work!
Excellent video, superbly done! As a young teen in the late 197o’s, I hung out at Palomar Airport in San Diego, California which had a gorgeous, pristine P-38 hangered there, being worked upon and flown by taciturn men who had no time for a fawning warbird enthusiast such as myself… I did manage to glean from them the fact that the magnificent plane been recently found in its original shipping crates, in new condition, & purchased by those men for the mere sum of 2oo,ooo dollars, a steal even then! Sadly, I heard a year or two later that she’d been wrecked due to engine failure brought about by a clogged oil line. The P-38 is one of the most exhilarating planes in the world to clap eyes upon, much the same magnitude of the heart skipping beauty of the Spitfire. Thanks for bringing up memories of yore Mr. Felton.
The one you are talking about is the former N74883/ N38DH/ N6961. The story of coming right out of a crate however is not correct, as it had been flying for several years. This one went to Honduras in 1948 for their air force before being brought back to the US in 1960. The interesting thing though is that it was bought surplus after WWII with several others by R. A. Wardell and Dick Martin of Oregon. Most were sold on in quick succession. After its return it changed hands several times including being owned by an ex- WWII P-38 pilot who had it painted up as his old mount. By 1977 it was with an airline pilot who kept it at Palomar with Marginal Airmotive, owned by the very same Dick Martin who had bought it surplus it in 1948. He even flew it to at least one airshow. It eventually crashed on take- off from Salt Lake City in 1981, killing the owner.
@ THANK YOU so much for the fascinating (and accurate) back story on this particular aircraft! Now that you have given the Tail numbers, I can mine the web for details. May I ask how you came by this much needed intel? Thanks again for posting!
@ @ THANK YOU so much for the fascinating (and accurate) back story on this particular aircraft! Now that you have given the Tail numbers, I can mine the web for details. May I ask how you came by this much needed intel? Thanks again for posting!
Guy Gibson did the same at night after s mission. No.fuel and ditched with Warwick. I alwsys cut the graves bush in the same design as as the Dambusterr Dam. It has the same shape around the 617 sw graves
Now this crashed P-38 I have heard of and seen the pictures of it, but until now I didn't know it's history or anything about it.....until Mr. Felton decided to make a video about it, so I am now much wiser....:) I even made an Airfix (I think) model of the P-38 (and the modded twin engined Mustang fighter) some 60 or more years ago when I was into modelling a mixture of plastic aircraft kits of British, US and German aircraft and tanks, but sadly today my hands and fingers are not as well controlled as the once were for painting and stuff....:)
In the book, "Unbroken", the survival account of B-24 bombardier (Not a pilot, as I mistakenly first posted) Louis Zamperini, I was horrified to learn that 50% of all US aircrew and plane losses in WW2 where from training and routine flights, not combat. Tens of thousands perished just preparing to fight, and their sacrifice to master the dangerous art of flying and war remain unrecognized. Seems unfair that their losses should be ignored, just becasue they never got the opportunity to fight.
My cousin flew P-38s in North Africa. Lt. Charles Earnhart later Cpt. then Major. Captured by the Germans after his second bailout. We are both related to the racing Earnhardts.
A well educated and researched doco on abandoned airfields in north Queensland, Northern Territory and Northern Western Australia would turn up some interesting pieces. 1000s of km2 where people rarely go, if ever. Even just the 100s rusting 44 gallon drums are facinating with various oil companies, airforce / army insigna stamps visable. One I went to years ago in Cape York had what I was told were a pair of near intact Beaufort wings wedged between trees. From mangled airframes to engine parts, vehicles, bomb dollies, ammo, down to ration tins and utensils. Tunic Buttons from US, Australia, Netherlands. There are a couple of good channels that explore thses very remote and inhospitable abandoned airfields and defences. Thousands of men and many hundreds of aircraft were stationed in far north Australia. When they moved to new Guinea, Asia and Pacific they didn't tidy up, essential equipment only, and move out. What remains is a golden mystery The property owners give permission and I believe have ownership of said items.
Are there any bases near that area presently? Obviously, during WWII, having airfields in the northern regions would be vital, but I wouldn't think that completely abandoning the area of air-security would be a good idea, but I do understand that a country's government can decide to do things based on budgetary needs. For example, I live near March Air Reserve Base in California (U.S.), this was an active air force base until the mid 1990s when massive military budget cuts were enacted, and the base was redesignated from "active" to "reserve." The base was actually active during WWII, only then it was designated as "March Field" under the U.S. Army Air Corps. (the U.S. Air Force not being an independent entity until after WWII).
Not in these locations, they were very rough dirt with the most permanent structures being briefing huts and outdoor movie screens, everything else equated to tents, camouflage nets and the flies or mosquitoes. They were often established and moved with in months to accommodate flight time or front line logistics. The better ones used termite mounds as road base, as with tennis courts. The most established infrastructure wise was most likely Gorrie airfield, with ovet 1000 men at its peak. Gorrie had extensive construction, with little left now. With modern speeds, flight times, these isolated, tempoary and rudimentary runways held no value post war, and additional development would have been not a war recovery agenda. Some did became private runways for cattle stations. A few became permemant servicing small towns, still ooccasionally being used for military exercises, accommodating loading or uploading. A few transformed to larger civilian and military airstrips, as they recieved significant infrastructure during the war, but these were near pre-existing major centres, not in the outback where I'm talking about. The best preserved ww2 airfield I know about is Evens Head ( absolutely no where near far noth Australia). The toilets and hanger are still the origional ww2 items, the billet huts were moved nearby and still used as accommodation. There are still some concrete bunkers. As a note, Where I lived In FNQ in the 1970s, the military dentists and doctors would also do civilian check ups during their deployment.
The former drag car racing strip in Townsville is a repurposed WW2 air strip. Unfortunately it may be re purposed once again as housing estate destroying what's left of the original structure. A bit of a shame if you ask me.
Excellent research and presentation. Pilot error can incipiently creep up on a pilot - hence checklists are a critical tool to make sure even routine tasks are not missed.
Thank you Professor!! My Grandpa built P 38's at Lockheed's Burbank plant in Southern Calif. There's a good chance that he had a hand in that plane's production! He was always proud of the Lightning and that he built them! And we were proud of him!
They did a helluva job on this airframe. Think of the strength it took to withstand 70+ years of wings full of sand and seawater, yet hold together like that.
@@dangvorbei5304 American WW2 industry was literally the definition of quality AND quantity. It was incredible.
@@kmmediafactory So True....
Same for my father....chances seem good that they knew each other.
@@kmmediafactory Negative. QUANTITY beat the Nazis, NOT quality. Our hardware was made to last just long enough to get the job done. Generally re German hardware, one of many reasons they lost was they over engineered everything. 🇺🇸
My sister in law has a grandfather who flew P38’s in the war. Shot down in September of 1944 over Holland he was a POW for about 9 months until his camp, Stalog Luft 1 was liberated by the Red army. An amateur historian in Holland has located and been digging up pieces of his crashed airplane in a farm in Holland. The pilot celebrates his one hundredth birthday this coming Sunday.
My uncle was also a POW in Stalag Luft 1.
These are true Warriors. To be honored.
Nice story ,,, very good , and please wish him a happy birthday from myself ,
Give him my best, hell of story
Thanks, please ensure that an article is created to cover the recovery and dispaly of the items and he is interviewed,
“Sleeping in the shallows…” What a beautiful turn of phrase, it describes me perfectly this morning. Thank you Mark for another wonderful story!
Hold tight for uk mandem my brudda
Replace "sleeping" with "hiding" and it takes on a very sinister tone.
@@bradsanders407 yooo stop yourself cuz
yes, exactly right to the point
Every so often there are U.S. Navy fighters found in Lake Michigan in America. A lot of pilots trained how to take off and land there during WW2 on a modified ship of some sort that was not a real Navy Aircraft Carrier. Some have been removed from the lake over the years but there haven't been any lately.
Dang thats pretty interesting!
I'm guessing these are the same pilots that liked breaking the sound barrier over the lake.
Wasn't that lake also planned to have been a testbed to those ice-made aircraft carriers?
And then there's the unpredictable weather patterns there.
The modified ship to which you refer was a side wheel steamer offering overnight passage in the days before bridges. I don’t recall the names ( there were 2, one I think was Wolverine) were converted to “-aircraft carriers “. They could only make 20 knots, so the winds of the lake had to suffice adding to tricky take off and landings ! There is a Great TH-cam video about these.
@@michaelandreipalon359 id still love to see a modern day mockup of a carrier made with the pykrete shit
"His squadron was less than pleased..." I bet! Thank you for that wonderful understatement and for this video in general.
While stationed at Marine Corps air Station Cherry point North Carolina we had wheel watch at the end of the runways! Not always. Sometimes, suppose with new pilots or whatever! Just to make sure their gear was down.
The guy who identified the aircraft from a picture of the wing tip reminds me of a brake shop experience I had as a teenager ( now 60). I took in my rotors and told him "I need these turned, and also brake pads for a ---" he interrupted with "1970 Caprice, I can tell from the rotors." I'm still impressed in the knowledge and expertise of that man. Since that day, when I need brake service, I've never even stepped foot in a different shop.
I was looking for bolts for some discs I'd bought for a friend's Transit. I walked into the local agricultural engineers with one disc and the bloke said "Ford Transit. The bolts don't fit, right?" He'd been there and done it.
My tutor at college could shut his eyes and feel the thickness of a feeler gauge
Guy knew his stuff
I think I can compete.
In the early 1990's I walked into a large auto parts store in N. California with a random casting from a 1952 John Deere 420c (not a common tractor), and the cashier says "Oh, John Deere 420....I used to make those!"
The factory was in the mid-west.
Smh.
@@darrellkimmel2646 Same here. I'm in Kansas. Don't you love when people know their job and do it well?
@@keving8006
Yeah, takes a few castings to know one on sight, especially 30+ years later.
There's a Lancaster in Pegwell Bay, just out from the Royal St. George Golf Club at Sandwich, Kent. I believe the aircraft was shot up over Germany and didn't quite make it back into Manston. In the early 60s it was exposed at low tide and an RAF Westland Whirlwind was photographed in the local paper dropping a man onto the wing.
What a fantastic video! My grandfather was a soldier with Patton's 3rd Army in Europe during the war. He grew up fascinated by planes and originally tried to enlist in the Army Air Corps, but was found to be color blind and ended up in a Chemical Mortar Battalion. He liked to tell the story of being in combat one day and seeing the unmistakable outline of a P38 engaged in a dogfight at low altitude with another plane overhead. Gunfire on the ground seemed to stop momentarily as soldiers looked up from their fox holes to watch the fight as those two dueled it out.
Coincidentally, today would have been his 97th birthday. I miss him dearly and cherish those WWII stories he told and love it, Mark, when one of your videos mentions something he was connected to in some way.
When you mentioned the pilot was towing a target, it reminded me of a story my father told me about during WWII in the Royal Navy he too was firing at a target being towed by an American pilot.
The American pilot radioed down saying “Remind those Limeys I’m pulling this target not pushing it”
I witnessed same thing, when BMP-2´s practicing anti-air shooting shot the plane. Pilot resigned after that.
LOL!
😂
Good one!
Thank you for sharing that story!! Gave me a laugh to start my day!
Years ago a kid was digging in the sand at the beach I lived at (Ocean Isle, NC) and found a P-47 that had set down after running out of gas on anti submarine patrol. I went to see them haul it out of the sand, the paint was largely intact and you could still see the star and bars insignia. I remember a man standing next to me saying "man, look at that thing, I wonder if they'll ever even know what it was?" I looked down and there was a big yellow cylinder. Painted on it was "bottle, cockpit oxygen" with about a paragraph of manufacturer and part number info. I just kinda looked over at the guy.
Gone to graveyards every one.
During an after war display, outside the coast of Copenhagen, a Blohm and Voss, German flying boat was shot at by English planes and sunk. And during the planning and built of the new tunnel and bridge to Sweden the wreck was re-found and a group of specially educated divers took it up and it is now being rebuilt at The Danish Technical Museum in Elsinore/Helsingør: Sadly, we had several of those German planes left when the war ended, but none is saved today.
Why did the english planes shoot it down?
@@Ramzi1944 Habit
How do you know it was English planes and not British ones possibly flown by many different nationalities?
He didn’t say it was shot down. He said it was sunk by planes in some sort of air display.
@@alasdairblack393 He probably intended to say British.
A great way to wake up this morning! Thank you, Mark!
As a descendant of one of the ground floor Lockheed aircraft design group it's just amazes me how resilient that airframe really is . Amazing pride in workmanship at that Burbank factory! when made in America meant ending tyranny ...
Agree completely - salt water initially for 65 years and still counting.
The wife has been working for Lockheed for forty years retires in another year.
Now nothing is made in America. Depressing, really.
My grandpa worked at the Lockheed Skunk Works. He couldn’t talk about his work but he dropped a few hints that in hindsight make me think he was working on stealth technology. One day my grandmother found his lawnmower abandoned in the middle of mowing the lawn. She freaked out and called my dad saying she thought the Russians might have abducted him. My dad drove over there and found him drinking beer in a neighbor’s backyard. Lol
@@wasidanatsali6374 he was just testing that stealth thing *g*
It's just like the Airacobras that landed on tidal beach flats in far northern Qld. A group of aircraft got lost on a mission or training and ran low on fuel and landed where they could. The aircraft were unrecoverable and decayed in the marine salt air on the tidal flats. The pilot crews were lucky to survive in such a remote location and were rescued. Better than being an impromptu meal for a salt water crocodile or a shark, or slowly staving to death with no local knowledge of local foods or bushcrafts.
Similar story to that P-40 found out in the desert at Al Wadi al Jadidi, Egypt in 2012.
Flt Sgt Dennis Copping was ferrying the aircraft to a repair station, survived the landing and ventured off on his own never to be seen again. The closest town was 200 miles away.
I remember that story very lucky indeed.
Yikes. saltwater crocs, that makes wild boars that circled our tracks when we were in our training area next to the dump.
I remember reading about that story many years ago - the Sunday paper at the time had colour pictures (!!!) of the wrecks. The nose sections were damaged when the military "safed" the ammunition stored there. Amazing to hear they're still there.
At least 2 have been recovered. 1 is in Mareeba at a Museum (Sid Beck museum) and another was being restored by a group who had it in a shed just south of Mossman (north of Cairns)
Years ago I visited the village of Mars in Papua where my father landed in 1944. Two miles away was a small island used as an airstrip by the army. On the airstrip were two P-38s stripped of their engines and guns. The locals used to go over and race the planes by pushing them down the runway.
For real? 😂
Papua New Guinea was littered with wrecks for many decades after WW2. I worked in Port Moresby for 4 years in the mid 90's, and became slightly obsessed with wreck hunting and gained many records from the Australian War Memorial to aid us. We found 2 previously unknown wrecks in around 20 metres of water by scuba diving. Very smashed up. There's still a lot left - one famous salvage of the 2000's being known as Swamp Ghost. Great to hear you trekked out all the way there to see for yourself where your father was. Much respect to you
They probably shoot at each other with .50 caliber blow-darts.
People can find these planes and I can't even find my own passwords...
Love your Australian and Chinese history bro!
That’s why I use LastPass!
I use a system to generate all my passwords so I don't have to remember them. I can always figure them out. I recommend everyone come up with their own system. I can still access my old email account that I haven't used in 10 years.
I think your passwords are all on a database in Mumbai.
bruh
Simply incredible.. It is almost as if mother nature is playing a game with us.. Allowing us to gain a peek at this historical treasure on a whim, only to cover it up again in order to preserve it until the day comes that someone can recover it and give it the respect deserved by such a beautiful design of the late, great Kelly Johnson.
I'm going to be stopping by in a few minutes. I hope to catch you before things start to get hectic.
Peek-A-Boo!
My father's favourite airplane. He and my uncles and auntie used to wave to the Yanks flying out over the Lincolnshire coast. He said there was a Lighting pilot that always used to drop low and wave back, which for any child is really something, ( An experience we would recieve later from Harrier pilots ). Apparently there was a shiny green Spitfire that used do the same, but he came in so low the kids were hugging the sod, all they saw of it was it disappearing into the distance.
I used to love listening to their stories of the war as children. One thing my dad could never do without was a tape with the drone of Merlin engines on it, it helped him sleep.
My next door neighbor was in the south Pacific during WWII as a radio operator. His only older brother was in the Pacific too and was a P-38 pilot. The older brother went out on a night mission and disappeared, no trace was ever found. The few times my neighbor talked about this tragedy it was obvious it was a crushing loss.
Thousands of aircraft with their crews, from all sides simply disappeared over water in WW2, most are probably in very deep waters so will never be found but some must be closer to land and might be discovered. Sadly they will now be disintegrating to the point where salvage is not a viable prospect but from an academic and human point of view it would be nice to finally be able to say what happened to the crews and where they were lost.
A lot of aircraft crashed into the Zuyder Zee during the War. Some were found as the sea was partially drained.
@@paulbradford8240 - When I was little I thought that was called ‘The Cider Sea’.
Many aircraft simply blew up. Their crews were vaporized. There will never be any way to know what happened to every crew.
@@AtheistOrphan sounds like a great place though👍🏻
@Lawnmower American The US forces deemed many of the US operated or loaned aircraft in Australia uneconomical to repatriate, and many were dumped at sea off the Australian coast.
RIP Robert Elliott. We will remember them.
He was a real screw up, crashing a valuable fighter due to the dumbest possible mistake.
Awesome video as usual Mark. I had lunch with my 92 year old uncle and his brother in law at the Admiral Rodney Pub near Shrewsbury few weeks ago and the conversation turned to the war. They still remember riding their bicycles as children to watch the 8th Air Force p-38's leaving RAF Atcham to escort bomber missions into Germany.
The P-38 might have been the important fighter of the war, which is incredible give how much we all worship the Spitfire, P-51, etc. It is the only American fighter that was produced throughout the war, from Pearl to VJ Day, with over 10,000 produced. It was shockingly versatile and was good value as a long-range fighter, especially helpful in the Pacific. The P-38 was the aircraft of America's top aces, Richard Bong (40 victories), Thomas McGuire (38 victories), and Charles H. MacDonald (27 victories). It could carry a heavy payload of bombs or rockets and was steadily improved throughout the war. While it didn't fare as well in Europe, and started to be overtaken by the P-51 as a air supremacy and bomber escort fighter, this machine absolutely helped us win the war and it deserves more respect than it seems to get.
I agree, well said. And I'd just like to add to all of that, one of the most iconic fighters of its era, and stunningly beautiful imho.
As do those that flew them 👍🏻🇬🇧
From what I've read, they were a real mother to fly in combat, though. Very complicated. But, Yamamoto might have some thoughts on the matter. So it can't have been too bad.
Beside all of that... it's just a beautiful airplane.🥰
It's such an awesome looking plane
Your poetical turn of phrase and masterful storytelling make any topic you cover riveting. Well done.
Pappy was on an airfield in New Guinea. He was with an anti-aircraft battery. It had P-38s & P-61s. The P-38 was his favorite.
Love P-38's. Built one out of legos when I was a kid.
Good on ya Matt Rimmer, you spent your whole life waiting for that moment, and you were on the ball. WELL DONE THAT MAN.
This is utterly fascinating to see these old birds rotting away on the shoreline. Incidentally, when my great great uncle Archie, of the Canadian Army, was stationed over in the UK, the area he was in was met with over 20 air raids by the Luftwaffe, not too far, I think, from these old beaches.
The P38 is my favorite WW2 fighter. We infact have one in a local museum. It crashed on the Timpanogas Mountain Utah USA and has since been recovered and restored. There is even a rusted original part by it in the museum.
Seeing this plane here makes me sad, I hope that in time it gets salvaged and restored for a museum just like the one I mentioned.
The intro music to Mark’s videos is very cool and compelling. And of course the videos are always educational and fascinating.
Thanks! Somewhere? In my brother's attic are photos my Dad took of the Surrender Bombers...in videos online of that day I've always wanted to see if I could find him by the camera angle. He always talked to us kids about how much he loved the P-38. Great video...I'm happy the found the old girl.
Mark, we all enjoy your videos. Keep up the good work
Yet another example of history's fascinating reach into time! Thank you Dr. Felton
There's a Wellington that crashed near me, sadly 4 crew died. There's still parts of it up on the memorial in the moors. Apparently there were also another couple very near me too, another Wellington and a Lancaster. There's a Comet on a beach not too far away either, didn't expect to see that there.
Thanks
A B-25 with full bomb load crashed into a hill near me and exploded. I found a piece of it’s fuselage underneath a hedge in the late 70’s. It’s displayed in a cabinet in my living room.
Summer of 78 I went into the domed church in Mosta Malta. There is a 500 pound bomb on display. The story goes that the church was filled with people during the heavy bombing period.The bomb crashed through the roof but didn't explode or hurt anyone.
Your channel is the most consistent, and interesting WW2 channel I have found. Thanks for all your hard work!!!!!!!!
If you search "Making P38 wreck diorama - The Maid Of Harlech" You can see an amazing model and diorama someone has made of this wreck.
Thank you for putting your videos together.
As always, this was a fascinating video. Strangely enough, the body of water which has the most wrecked US WWII aircraft is Lake Michigan off the coast of Chicago. The US War and Navy Departments did not to train pilots on either the Atlantic or Pacific Coasts for fear of Axis attacks, so the Great Lakes were chosen for training pilots and carrier crews. Two old side-wheeled pleasure boats were converted into makeshift aircraft carriers, and Chicago's Navy Pier became the base to house the crews. (For a brief while, one of carrier trainees was my Dad, who was soon re-assigned to other posts, including Jacksonville, FL.). Most of the Navy Air Force pilots and carrier crews trained on Lake Michigan, including future president, George H.W. Bush.
Though Lake Michigan's inland location made enemy attacks impossible, many training mishaps still occurred. Thankfully, few lives were lost (even in the brutal Midwest winters) as rescuers quickly recovered downed pilots. Still, many planes were lost and remain at the bottom of Lake Michigan, making it the most common place for WWII wrecks.
I love your war stories. Whether before WWII during or afterwards! Please don't stop!
Live on the North Carolina coast. We have a boat that we use for island hopping & fishing. Last year, i found what i assumed was the keel of a blockade runner wreck on Bear Island. In 3 feet of surf at low tide, there were hundreds of long rusty bolts, minimal 2.5 feet long. The "keel" was about 60' long, and 18" wide. The bolts were in rows of 5, and the rows were about 1' center to center.
The next time i came to the island, the sand had covered it. The park rangers were not interested.
That is so awesome! Thanks Dr. Felton! An amazing history on the pilot and aircraft! 👌👍
I seem to recall a German WW2 bomber was found in the silt of the Humber estuary about 20 years ago and, similarly, another off the Tees. One of them had a skeletal crew member with tags intact.
Yes I think your right about that it had attacked the steelworks where I was an electrical technician at redcar tjat site is full of history sad day when it closed
Do-17 👍
I was never a fan of school left young long story short between you and the operations room i am slowly becoming a history nut the details and research that must go into these videos alone merit the upmost respect , fair play to you sir .
The P-38 has always been one of my favorite WW2 planes. They are so cool!
Along with the German rocket and jet Messerschmitts
Yeah, my grandfather flew one among other planes. He was fond of it too.
@@CAP198462 that's cool! My grandfather was a radio operator on a PBY Catalina during the war. They did primarily search and rescue missions.
@@c0rnp0p80 that’s neat, got a tour of a restored PBY years ago. It was spacious for one man with a sleeping bag. My grandfather was one of only a handful of men to bail out of a P-38 and survive. It wasn’t an easy plane to jump from because of the tail assembly, your TAS had to be just right or you’d break your neck on the tail assembly.
@@CAP198462 that's crazy! Glad to hear he made it.
My grandfather told me a funny story about the first time his crew practiced taking off and landing on water. One of the senior guys had a bunch of unsharpened pencils tied up in a rubber band. He asked him what that was for, and he told him he'd find out. Well, the first time they hit the water my grandfather said he heard a bunch of rivets popping out, and the guy with the pencils would take one out, plug it in the holes where the rivets popped out, and break them off. He said that would hold it until after they were done and the mechanics could fix them properly. And that's how the Navy did things back then lol.
Great video. When I was on a NOAA ship in Alaska, it wasn't uncommon to see wrecks from WW2 appear in the shallow surf.
I love these stories about ww2 aircraft being rediscovered after so long, I hope this particular aircraft eventually makes it's way into a museum and I'd also love to hear more stories about ww2 era vehicles.
It won’t mate it’s a scheduled monument by CADW.
maybe it doesn't need to make it into a museum with walls and cement. maybe it is just fine where it is.
@@redshoesgirl absolutely. It’s not unique. Leave it where it is.
Love the story, watch it with a cup of coffee before work. Delightful.
This is indeed a treasure and needs to be preserved. My fear is that now this has been shown on TH-cam it will be plundered by metal detectors and sold off in little bits. Air shows used to be full of such stalls.
Nope, just up the road from me, only exposed at very low tides and is usually covered in sand, it has protected status, no one has touched it.
@@chris6559 that is great to know
@@chris6559 Hi, Chris. It's hard to see clearly, but it looks like the guns might be missing. Since it landed in very shallow water (at the time), maybe the USAAF tried to recover some of the easier to extract items, like the guns and maybe the radio?
some of the best evenings in life spent on a trek with Mark Felton
Wonderful retrospective, amazing that these relics still exist in our modern time. As always thank you Dr Felton for this great content 🙂
Yes but he does not list the facts. The p38 is a scheduled monument listed by the Welsh Government ‘CADW’. Scheduled monuments are rarely even touched let alone recovered.
Keep on keeping on , Dr. FELTON ! YOU ARE THE BEST , MY FRIEND !!
MoD brushing it off. Glad the person had persisted with the story.
Amazing story. A decades old wreck appears and reminds us of one guys ultimate sacrifice long ago in a foreign land far from his home for the freedom of people who never even knew of him. Makes me want to cry.
It’s always interesting to find these planes some of them rare examples in places where they can recovered and restored for display
Another one is about to surface.
Lake mead . Be cool to see something on its history.
Wait, you referring to that B-29 Superfortress, Bobby Fhet?
You are still the best. Thanks again.
So much for the enthusiasm of the Ministry of Defence. Won’t be asking for your help ever again. Ministry of Couldn’t Care Less.
I know that the English side of the Solway Firth has some Hudson Bombers in the Estuary after training exercises went wrong. There is a wreck near Anthorn, sometimes you can see the tail fin. They used to call it Hudson Bay.
Fantastic Mark, this plane has to be salvaged ! As a Dutchman, I tend to think, how hard can it be ? Im sure there are some good Dutch company's that would love to do this job. We have some very active war rescue company's, very suitable for this kinda job. Im sure you know this already :) Im donating for this :)
Have a look at the Do17 pulled from the Thames a few years ago, it looked complete in situ, they ended pulling out a pile of fragile heavily corroded junk, despite their best efforts.
Outstanding work as always sir well done
There's a real "forgotten" ww2 plane wreck on an island north of Cooktown, Queensland.
On Low Wooded island, there's an A-20 Havoc that didn't officially exist.
It was built from the remains of two written off aircraft.
Based in New Guinea and dubbed "Steak and Eggs" the pilots used to use it to fly to Australia on unauthorised shopping trips to pick up supplies that were hard to get in New Guinea.
Eventually it suffered a mechanical problem and crash landed on the island.
It's in pieces now, and often little of it is visible, but sometimes the sand uncovers some large parts.
Great story. Thanks for the history. My salute to a very resourceful aircrew.
Hi Mark.
Thanks for another great video. This particular one is of great interest because my parents moved to Harlech in 1995 and my Dad is still there, so we know the area well. In your film at 0:28 in the bottom of the top right hand third of the picture you can see part of a pine tree plantation. The woodland has been cleared extensively in recent years but about fifteen years ago my Wife and I discovered a massive embankment built with sandbags about 10-12 feet high, 15 feet wide and hundreds of yards long forming a continous structure which is roughly hourglass shape. This can be found on O.S. maps of the area.
In one place a breach has been created to allow cattle to pass through. We originally thought it was an old sea defense structure but, it turns out it was actually an RAF air gunnery range. Since the pine forest has been cleared the the embankment is now clearly visible. It was built to support a narrow gauge railway line along which small locomotives hauled targets for air gunnery crews, located in the enclosed area formed by the embankment, to shoot at. This area is now however heavily overgrown with grass and bushes so it's difficult to work what if anything is still there. The facility was linked to the main West Coast Railway Line by a spur line located approximately one mile north of Harlech railway station. The remains of the embankment for this spur line and where it crosses the main A496 road can still be seen. Very little information can be found online about this gunnery range and I haven't been able to find any photographs of it from the war years. On one particular occasion though, we did found a large chunk part of a tank turret with the barrel mantlet half buried in the ground. So, there may be other artefacts still there.
Keep up the great work.
There are certainly many undiscovered war wrecks, any where fighting occured. I just saw a cartoon video of a famous Russian fighter pilot, who went missing. A freind of hers looked for her wreckage, finding it som sixty years after the war. The pilot still in the wreck with a head wound. supposedly, many many wrecks were found. I have seen many videos of bunkers and weapons being found, also. Grim reminders.
Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak, also known as Lilya, was a fighter pilot in the Soviet Air Force during World War II. Historians estimate for her total victories range from five to twelve solo victories and two to four shared kills in her 66 combat sorties.
Amazing find! Would like to see it preserved and at least displayed for further generations to see! Great video Mark! 👍
🏆🏆🏆👍🇺🇲🙏
Thank you for sharing
My favorite wartime topic: Aircraft. Excellent one, Mark!
P-38 was an amazing plane and apparently a dream to fly
popular with the Ruskees as well / many were sent Lease Lend/ War Aid
Robin Olds flew the P-38 on D-Day. His account of witnessing D-Day from his P-38 in his biography “ Fighter Pilot” is magnificent.
It had compressability problems.
@@rogersmith7396 which were fixed by adding automatic airbrakes
@@stevenweasel2678 negative; Russians never had them. P-39, yes
Mark, Thanks! Love your videos... Keep'em coming!
Makes me think about the various stories of brand new aircraft, sometimes even entire squadrons, still in their crates buried at various airfields around the world at the end of the war. Ahhh if only one of those stories bore fruit.
Might make an interesting one for you to cover Mark?
Yeah, this remind of the 18 Spitfires? I presume, that were buried in Birma. They were wrapped in oil paper or cloth, and then burried. A few year ago they were found, so the story went, but I never heard from it again. I recall that it was the same year that Top Gear also went to Birma to do a special. I was convinced that they would visit the site were the planes were, but they didn't sadly. Maybe Mark can look into this again, it would be so awesome if these planes are found !
Another awesome video, thanks again for sharing with us Mr Felton!👍🏻👍🏻✨
As usual a great video . I for one hope it can be recovered and displayed in a British Museum . Thanks
Roughly ten years ago, I visited the Imperial War Museum in London. Absolutely incredible! Also "Churchill's War Rooms". Another must see!
Fabulous work, as ever ,Mark .
Great video!
Thanks Mark. Hopefully it will be worth recovering it.
But it’s a scheduled monument classified by the Welsh Government and will never be touched
I always considered the P-51 to be the best-looking fighter of WW2, but IMO the P-38 was the COOLEST fighter of WW2. Such a unique airplane...and good-looking too in its own way.
Na. Mosquito is the most interesting. From design and manufacturing to operations. Some of its characteristics are incredible. Like carrying the same weight of bombs as a b17 with 2 engines?
@@johnrobertson9875 faster, higher and further too!
Thank you!
May my relative Rest In Peace
The P-38 was a thing of technological and physical beauty. It was a tricky aircraft to fly. So many things to remember I had the opportunity to see one close up back when the Scatterbrain Kid (serial #: 43-50281) was being restored at Lafayette Regional Airport. Got to look inside the cockpit. Most noticable thing to me was the "steering wheel" rather than a control stick like there was in other fighters.
I've never flown an aircraft, but I would imagine such a yoke would be more effective than the stick mostly found on other planes.
My Great Grandfather was in Britain during World War Two. He would often go out into fields and go to the remains of German bombers and planes shot down. He would pick up bits of Plexiglas or acrylic glass from the planes. At the time is was a very new and cool thing however I truly have no idea why he did it.
just wanted a collection I'd assume
Plexiglas was often fashioned into rings or other souvenirs.
another fantastic story mark thank you
With the long lasting drought in the Western US, Lake Mead is drying up revealing many long lost treasures. Besides a newly found Higgins boat, a previously located B29 bomber is now becoming visible from the surface.
Guess that Fallout: New Vegas sidequest is slowly becoming reality.
love the images
So interesting.... In my town, approximately 15 miles Northeast of Selfridge Air National Guard Base, Michigan, a P-38 crashed in a field near where my house is sometime in 1943. Selfridge was a major training base during WW2. My father, a teenager at the time, vividly remembered the P-38 crash, since it occurred near my great-grandfather's farm. The pilot was killed, and his parachute was found many miles from where his body fell after bailing out. Several years ago, a team of military archeologists found some of the parts of the P-38 that were buried in the ground due to the high speed impact of the crash. My father told me of several crashes in the area during the war, including a P-47 and a B-25. In most of the crashes, the aircrew were killed.
Interesting video Mark - keep up the good work!
Let's hope it can be saved from rusting away from history, big thanks for share the link to help origination.
Excellent video, superbly done!
As a young teen in the late 197o’s, I hung out at Palomar Airport in San Diego, California which had a gorgeous, pristine P-38 hangered there, being worked upon and flown by taciturn men who had no time for a fawning warbird enthusiast such as myself… I did manage to glean from them the fact that the magnificent plane been recently found in its original shipping crates, in new condition, & purchased by those men for the mere sum of 2oo,ooo dollars, a steal even then!
Sadly, I heard a year or two later that she’d been wrecked due to engine failure brought about by a clogged oil line.
The P-38 is one of the most exhilarating planes in the world to clap eyes upon, much the same magnitude of the heart skipping beauty of the Spitfire. Thanks for bringing up memories of yore Mr. Felton.
The one you are talking about is the former N74883/ N38DH/ N6961. The story of coming right out of a crate however is not correct, as it had been flying for several years. This one went to Honduras in 1948 for their air force before being brought back to the US in 1960. The interesting thing though is that it was bought surplus after WWII with several others by R. A. Wardell and Dick Martin of Oregon. Most were sold on in quick succession. After its return it changed hands several times including being owned by an ex- WWII P-38 pilot who had it painted up as his old mount. By 1977 it was with an airline pilot who kept it at Palomar with Marginal Airmotive, owned by the very same Dick Martin who had bought it surplus it in 1948. He even flew it to at least one airshow. It eventually crashed on take- off from Salt Lake City in 1981, killing the owner.
@
THANK YOU so much for the fascinating (and accurate) back story on this particular aircraft! Now that you have given the Tail numbers, I can mine the web for details. May I ask how you came by this much needed intel? Thanks again for posting!
@
@
THANK YOU so much for the fascinating (and accurate) back story on this particular aircraft! Now that you have given the Tail numbers, I can mine the web for details. May I ask how you came by this much needed intel? Thanks again for posting!
Guy Gibson did the same at night after s mission.
No.fuel and ditched with Warwick.
I alwsys cut the graves bush in the same design as as the Dambusterr Dam.
It has the same shape around the 617 sw graves
Now this crashed P-38 I have heard of and seen the pictures of it, but until now I didn't know it's history or anything about it.....until Mr. Felton decided to make a video about it, so I am now much wiser....:)
I even made an Airfix (I think) model of the P-38 (and the modded twin engined Mustang fighter) some 60 or more years ago when I was into modelling a mixture of plastic aircraft kits of British, US and German aircraft and tanks, but sadly today my hands and fingers are not as well controlled as the once were for painting and stuff....:)
Thank you Mark for your videos of history!!!
In the book, "Unbroken", the survival account of B-24 bombardier (Not a pilot, as I mistakenly first posted) Louis Zamperini, I was horrified to learn that 50% of all US aircrew and plane losses in WW2 where from training and routine flights, not combat. Tens of thousands perished just preparing to fight, and their sacrifice to master the dangerous art of flying and war remain unrecognized. Seems unfair that their losses should be ignored, just becasue they never got the opportunity to fight.
He was a bombardier, not a pilot, but that's OK. You make a greater point, that preparing for war is dangerous. Great book, BTW, recommend it !
@@SunnnyDay Thanks. All corrections welcomed!
Thank you Mark.
My cousin flew P-38s in North Africa.
Lt. Charles Earnhart later Cpt. then Major. Captured by the Germans after his second bailout.
We are both related to the racing Earnhardts.
So, you all feel the need.. the need, for speed?
Keep 'em coming Mark!
Once again, an amazing story. Thanks Dr. Felton:)
Fascinating history thank you 👏👏🏴🇬🇧
A well educated and researched doco on abandoned airfields in north Queensland, Northern Territory and Northern Western Australia would turn up some interesting pieces. 1000s of km2 where people rarely go, if ever.
Even just the 100s rusting 44 gallon drums are facinating with various oil companies, airforce / army insigna stamps visable. One I went to years ago in Cape York had what I was told were a pair of near intact Beaufort wings wedged between trees. From mangled airframes to engine parts, vehicles, bomb dollies, ammo, down to ration tins and utensils. Tunic Buttons from US, Australia, Netherlands. There are a couple of good channels that explore thses very remote and inhospitable abandoned airfields and defences. Thousands of men and many hundreds of aircraft were stationed in far north Australia. When they moved to new Guinea, Asia and Pacific they didn't tidy up, essential equipment only, and move out. What remains is a golden mystery The property owners give permission and I believe have ownership of said items.
Are there any bases near that area presently? Obviously, during WWII, having airfields in the northern regions would be vital, but I wouldn't think that completely abandoning the area of air-security would be a good idea, but I do understand that a country's government can decide to do things based on budgetary needs. For example, I live near March Air Reserve Base in California (U.S.), this was an active air force base until the mid 1990s when massive military budget cuts were enacted, and the base was redesignated from "active" to "reserve." The base was actually active during WWII, only then it was designated as "March Field" under the U.S. Army Air Corps. (the U.S. Air Force not being an independent entity until after WWII).
My dad was stationed there in WW2. A Wisconsin farm boy, when he returned, He told my mother that if she ever cooked mutton, he would kill her!
Not in these locations, they were very rough dirt with the most permanent structures being briefing huts and outdoor movie screens, everything else equated to tents, camouflage nets and the flies or mosquitoes. They were often established and moved with in months to accommodate flight time or front line logistics. The better ones used termite mounds as road base, as with tennis courts. The most established infrastructure wise was most likely Gorrie airfield, with ovet 1000 men at its peak. Gorrie had extensive construction, with little left now.
With modern speeds, flight times, these isolated, tempoary and rudimentary runways held no value post war, and additional development would have been not a war recovery agenda.
Some did became private runways for cattle stations. A few became permemant servicing small towns, still ooccasionally being used for military exercises, accommodating loading or uploading.
A few transformed to larger civilian and military airstrips, as they recieved significant infrastructure during the war, but these were near pre-existing major centres, not in the outback where I'm talking about.
The best preserved ww2 airfield I know about is Evens Head ( absolutely no where near far noth Australia). The toilets and hanger are still the origional ww2 items, the billet huts were moved nearby and still used as accommodation. There are still some concrete bunkers.
As a note, Where I lived In FNQ in the 1970s, the military dentists and doctors would also do civilian check ups during their deployment.
The former drag car racing strip in Townsville is a repurposed WW2 air strip. Unfortunately it may be re purposed once again as housing estate destroying what's left of the original structure. A bit of a shame if you ask me.
@@rodrogers6895 Mate, what's wrong with mutton?
Fascinating! The tank discoveries are also very intriguing-the stories they could tell!
my favorite beach in the UK,,(shell island) is just amazing,xxx
Excellent research and presentation. Pilot error can incipiently creep up on a pilot - hence checklists are a critical tool to make sure even routine tasks are not missed.
The corrosion on that plane is massive. I can’t, for the life of me, see “restoration” as a viable option.
Agreed
@@hwvanzant3007 they didn't say it would be restored, they said it would be displayed.
Any action would be a huge waste
@@reallyhappenings5597 why ? Better spent on that aircraft than wasting money on illegal immigrants
@@grahamjordan1040 Putting an object before human life, you sound like the people we were fighting in WW2.
Always an outstanding video and presentation.