Some Of Our Airmen Are No Longer Missing

The B24 recovery was in the IJsselmeer, the largest one in the Netherlands. It’s fresh water.
I’m sorry to say in general getting the missing out was and is not the main objective of
The RNethAF. When draining the land wrecks became visible. In several instances
Kids took wepons and ammunition, so something had to be one by recovering
The wrecks. Alo during digging of canals or building roads in the reclaimed area wreckage
Was removed, but not everything was recovered as to this day wreckage is found by
Farmers. Never the finding if missing aircrew was priority. The B24 case being an
Exeption. Building a dyke to the wreck was done by army engineers so were paid or
By the taxpayer. The work had to be sped up an hurried because of other priorities.
The airframe was very substantial but was almost completely destroyed. The complete
Wing was cut in bits using explosives. For mr Zwanenburg this was one heck if an PR
Campaign and many still feel that the Dutch are leaders in locating missing aircrew, I am sorry
To say that is a myth. That dicumentary is part of this PR too and is usually taken a gospel.
What about the hundreds of missing in known locations that are ignored? It all comes
Down to one thing: money
Cheers
Cees

Thanks for that info Eric. I’m surprised you say that it was poor economic times because it cannot have been cheap to employ the army to build that road into the sea during a four month period, and I’m sure this was one of many recoveries going on at the time. I was thinking while watching the film that their budget must be huge and the country pretty rich.

Any idea how many aircraft have been recovered in this way from the water, and are the recoveries still reasonably frequent? Or has the push to reclaim land slowed down/stopped?

I assume it’s salt water?

It would be interesting to know what happened to the wreckage and artefacts recovered. Maybe on display somewhere in Holland?

A fair amount was scrapped. Conservation was in its infancy at the time, and to be fair a large amount of the wrecks found were in very poor condition to begin with (mostly high-speed impacts in shallow waters). This combined with the poor economical situation at the time did not bode well for the artifacts to be recovered. Times have changed since then! Also, bear in mind that most of the time, effort and money spent on the operation to clear any wreckage from this future highly valued agricultural ground was spent on the most important aspect: bringing home the crew members that were missing.

The museum at Soesterberg though still has a large amount of items and sections on display, and a lot more in storage. They include turrets, engines, propellors, wheels, some airframe sections etc.

yes, I have seen that one and have a copy. A wonderful film. Footage from it appears in all three of Jack Currie’s films.

This is a good one – ‘Night Bombers’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujLVIlESNGE

Thanks to your tip Jim C, as well as The Watchtower I’ve had a lazy Sunday – but an enlightening one – watching Jack Currie’s other two documentaries, The Lancaster Legend, and The Ausburg Raid, on Youtube. All three are superb and I’d recommend them highly.

Got any more suggestions for good quality vintage RAF Bomber Command documentaries?

I just watched The Watchtower, what a superb documentary that was. Really good. And such a good presenter too.

Thanks for the link Dave, just finished watching. There were quite a few good documentaries around at that time as I recall, such as The Watchtower with Jack Currie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfj0OnSb53A

I have it on a old VHS tape.

Dave

Thanks for the link Dave, just finished watching. There were quite a few good documentaries around at that time as I recall, such as The Watchtower with Jack Currie.

It would be interesting to know what happened to the wreckage and artefacts recovered. Maybe on display somewhere in Holland?