Sunken Treasures

The bottom of Lake Michigan yields a treasure trove of World War II aircraft, many of them veterans of major battles including Pearl Harbor, Midway and the Solomons. Today, these planes are being retrieved and restored to impress their lessons on a new generation.

George H. W. Bush in 1944

BY CRAIG RITCHIE

Sometimes you fi nd the most remarkable things where you least expect to see them, including on your sonar screen. For historians looking to preserve irreplaceable artifacts from the second world war, it doesn’t get any better than the bottom of Lake Michigan right off the Chicago lakeshore. That’s where a dedicated team has spent the past 30 years scanning the lakebed for historically signifi cant aircraft, veterans of battles that raged all across the Pacifi c.

The aircraft — almost perfectly preserved by their ice-cold freshwater tombs — were lost in the ‘40s when the U.S. Navy conducted pilot training on the lake. There, safe from prowling enemy submarines, two former passenger excursion vessels that were hastily converted into makeshift aircraft carriers helped more than 17,000 pilots qualify for carrier duty, including future President George H. W. Bush. But accidents were frequent, and at least 150 aircraft wound up on the bottom through landing accidents and misjudged takeoffs. As salvage crews today recover these aircraft for museum display, they’re fi nding some of them to be veterans of major Pacifi c battles — Pearl Harbor, Midway, the Solomons — making these historic aircraft internationally signifi cant.

After being damaged in battle or simply outdated by newer, more potent models, these planes were typically sent back to America and relegated to training duties. Most would have been scrapped at war’s end had they not taken the big splash. But being bounced off a carrier deck and into the drink by a newbie pilot is precisely what saved them from a cutting torch, and we’re all the better for it.

Wolverine and Sable

In early 1942, with every aircraft carrier available pressed into front-line service, the U.S. Navy’s pilot training organization found itself in a tough spot. Training pilots to operate from aircraft carrier decks required actual ships to train on. But with no carriers available, the Navy was forced to improvise. The answer lay in moving pilot training inland to the Great Lakes and converting a couple of existing vessels to provide the requisite fl ight decks. In due course the Navy purchased a pair of old sidewheel paddle steamers once used for passenger excursions, replaced their topside accommodations with fl at wooden runways and commissioned their fi rst two dedicated training carriers: USS Wolverine and USS Sable.

Although smaller than the fl eet carriers the Navy used in combat, the 500-foot Wolverine and the 535-foot Sable were the answer to a big problem, enabling pilots to learn to handle takeoffs and landings on a real fl ight deck in an environment where the vessels would be safe Wolverine with Hellcat from enemy submarines.

USS Wolverine and USS Sable were not true aircraft carriers and they had a number of serious limitations, one being that they had only one deck and thus nowhere to stow any damaged aircraft. If a plane was damaged, the day’s operations would be forced to wrap up.

Another limitation was a lack of speed. Built as passenger excursion vessels, neither Wolverine nor Sable were equipped with powerful engines, and that was a real concern for pilots operating heavier aircraft that required a certain amount of wind fl owing down the fl ight deck in order for them to become airborne. When there was little or no wind on Lake Michigan, operations often had to be curtailed.

On days with plenty of wind, the now top-heavy ships tended to pitch and roll wildly in the choppy waves, making takeoffs and landings even more hazardous than they would be on a real aircraft carrier operating on the open ocean. Early and late in the year, ice build-up was yet another serious problem — not just on the carrier decks, but on the aircraft as well.

Accidents and rookie mistakes were inevitable, and nearly 150 planes wound up becoming fi sh habitat on the bottom of Lake Michigan. All remain the property of the U.S. Navy, which has allowed for some of the planes to be recovered for museum display. Most have been salvaged by a private fi rm called A and T Recovery, founded by partners Allan Olson and Taras Lyssenko after they spotted what appeared to be an airplane on their fi shfi nder screen one day while trolling for salmon off Chicago.

Today, A and T Recovery works in close partnership with the U.S. Navy and its National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola, Florida, in order to locate, identify and recover these vintage aircraft. To date they’ve fi shed nearly 40 of them from the bottom, including U.S. Bureau No. 2106, a priceless Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless dive bomber with a truly remarkable history.

Wolverine and Sable in Chicago

Wolverine at Navy Pier, Chicago

Sable

No. 2106 on display The survivor

SBD Dauntless No. 2106 on Midway Island Built in Long Beach, California, Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless No. 2106 was delivered to the U.S. Navy on December 29, 1940. It was assigned to squadron Bombing 2 onboard the aircraft carrier USS Lexington and was onboard the carrier when it arrived at Pearl Harbor on December 1, 1941. Two days later, when the vessel departed for Wake Island to deliver a load of aircraft for the Marines, the Lexington’s own air group remained behind to make room for the cargo. The morning of December 7 saw Dauntless No. 2106 parked on Ford Island, where it survived the full fury of the Japanese attack with comparatively minor damage. Repaired and reunited with the USS Lexington, the airplane took part in a series of hit-and-run air raids on Japanese positions throughout the South Pacifi c during early 1942. After the Lexington was sunk that May during the Battle of Coral Sea, the aircraft was reassigned to the Marines and promptly delivered to Midway Island as part of bombing squadron VMSB-241. On the morning of June 4, 1942, Dauntless No. 2106 launched from the island to attack the Japanese carrier fl eet as the Battle of Midway began. Mauled by Japanese fi ghters, Dauntless No. 2106 was the only aircraft of its squadron to return — peppered with no less than 259 bullet holes and with both its pilot, Lt. Daniel Iverson, and its gunner, Pvt. 1st Class Wallace Reid, seriously wounded. Although their attack on the Japanese aircraft carrier Hiryu was unsuccessful, Iverson was subsequently awarded the SBD Dauntless No. 2106 recovery Navy Cross and Reid the Distinguished Flying Cross for their actions that day fl ying SBD No. 2106. Following the Battle of Midway, the well-perforated bomber was returned to the U.S., once again repaired, and this time delivered to the Ninth Naval District Carrier Qualifi cation Training Unit in Chicago for use as a training platform. Assigned to the USS Sable, the aircraft was fl own by dozens of pilots on their way to earning their aircraft carrier qualifi cation. But by June 1943, No. 2106’s luck had run out, and the bomber was lost in a landing accident, stalling on its fi nal approach, cartwheeling into the lake and sinking in 165 feet of water. Its rookie pilot was seriously injured, but survived to fl y again. Recovered from Lake Michigan by A and T Recovery in 1990, the most historically valuable SBD Dauntless in existence was lovingly

SBD Dauntless

restored to factory-fresh condition by the National Naval Aviation Museum, where it remains on display today.

the last of many

The Vought SB2U Vindicator was the U.S. Navy’s standard dive bomber through the late 1930s, until it was replaced by the vastly superior SBD Dauntless. Still in use by a handful of Marine squadrons right up until the Battle of Midway, the Vindicator was state-of-the-art when it fi rst took to the skies in 1936 and all its contemporaries were biplanes. But by the outbreak of WWII, it was seriously obsolete and, in the face of skilled enemy fi ghter pilots, a death trap.

Assigned to USS Ranger, SB2U Vindicator No. 1383 spent most of its career fl ying anti-submarine patrols along the Atlantic coast before being replaced by the more modern SBD in early 1943. Overhauled and sent to Chicago that May, it was assigned to USS Wolverine. A little more than a month later, a Marine 2nd Lt. named A. W. Lemmons wrote it off in an accident when he overshot the landing area, crashed into a safety barrier and skidded over the No. 1383 settled into the lakebed 130 feet below. Recovered in 1990, the aircraft’s metal parts were covered in zebra mussels while the extensive areas of canvas that once covered its tail and control surfaces had long rotted away, leaving only its spindly aluminium

SB2U

side. Lt. Lemmons was rescued without a scratch, while Vindicator

Vindicator No. 1383

frame. Carefully restored over a span of eight years by a team of dedicated volunteers at the National Naval Aviation Museum, it’s proudly displayed today as the only known Vindicator in existence.

the workhorse of the solomons

While the vast majority of Grumman F6F Hellcat fi ghters fl ew from aircraft carriers, a small number operated from land bases — including bureau No. 25910, a very special Hellcat that was recovered from Lake Michigan in 2009.

Hellcat No. 25910 was assigned to Navy fi ghter squadron VF38, which operated from a succession of different air strips carved out of the jungles of Guadalcanal, New Georgia and Bougainville during the Solomon Islands battles of 1943. There it proved itself a true workhorse, participating in dozens of dangerous bomber escort and fi ghter sweep missions through the region including several ultra-dangerous attacks on major Japanese air bases at Hellcat bad landing Kahili and Ballalae. The aircraft’s logbook further shows Hellcat No. 25910 was among the aircraft that provided protective escort for U.S. Hellcat Bureau No. 25910 recovery Navy Admiral Bull Halsey during his November 1943 inspection trip of the area. The plane ultimately completed three full combat tours with VF38 from September 1943 to March 1944 — a remarkable record in a region where most aircraft seldom lasted more than a couple of weeks before they were destroyed.

Having been repaired from battle damage on multiple occasions, No. 25910 was by that point considered a tired airplane. Returned to the U.S., it was completely overhauled and reassigned to USS Sable in Chicago Hellcat Bureau No. 25910 restored that fall. Its fi nal fl ight occurred on January 5, 1945 when Navy Lt. W. B. Elcock came in too low and clipped the deck while attempting to land. The Hellcat fl ipped upside down and careened across the fl ight deck before sliding over the side and into Lake Michigan. Elcock was promptly rescued and treated for his injuries, but No. 25910 wasn’t seen again for another 64 years until it was fi shed out of the lake by A and T Recovery in 2009.

Painstakingly restored, it resides today at the National Naval Aviation Museum.

the birdcage

Not all of the aircraft lost on the Great Lakes were war-weary veterans of major battles. One of the rarest fi nds to date went into the lake pretty well straight from the factory.

In the spring of 1943, the Vought F4U Corsair was the hottest military aircraft anywhere in the world. The fi rst single-engine U.S. fi ghter to exceed 400 mph in level fl ight, the gull-winged Corsair was fast, maneuverable and tough — and more than a match for the until-then invincible Mitsubishi Zero. Training pilots on the new plane was seen as a top priority.

F4U Corsair No. 02465 recovery

Delivered to the Navy just a few weeks before it arrived in Chicago, Corsair No. 02465 had only fl own for a handful of hours — and likely still had that new plane smell — when it suffered a landing accident aboard USS Wolverine. On his fi rst attempt at landing on a moving ship, Navy Lt. G.G. Webster made a near-perfect approach but had inexplicably forgotten to lower his landing gear. Misunderstanding frantic attempts to wave him off as instructions to cut his engine and land, he chopped power, the big fi ghter plowed into the Wolverine’s deck and steamrollered over two other fi ghters before it fi nally careened over the side. Webster miraculously escaped without injury, but the brand-new Corsair is said to have “fl oated like an anvil.”

Initially discovered in the early 1990s standing on its nose in close to 250 feet of water, the Corsair’s tail had broken off at some point in its descent but otherwise it appeared to be in good condition. Deeper than many other more easily accessible wrecks, it stood on its nose for another 20 years before it was fi nally recovered in 2010. To the delight of the recovery team, it was found to be a very early “birdcage” Corsair, constructed with a cockpit canopy formed from multiple glass panels mounted on a sliding aluminum frame. This type of canopy was soon replaced on the production line with a blown bubble-type that offered far better pilot visibility, and which appeared on the vast majority of Corsairs built.

Now fully restored to its original factory-fresh condition, birdcage Corsair No. 02465 can be seen today on static display at the National Naval Aviation Museum. ★