Daniel Hunt & Kevin Hunt
Russian Recoveries / Curators of Wings Museum
Daniel Hunt & Kevin Hunt
Redhill Aerodrome
Surrey, United Kingdom
We have taken a huge gamble but one
that we have always dreamed of. We strongly believe that these airframes
are best recovered so that they can be preserved for future generations
to enjoy. We also appreciate that these sites need to be recorded and we
always do our upmost in ensuring this. It is our intentions to keep at least some of the projects
that we bring back but many will be offered for sale to recoup some of
our costs, any profit will be ploughed back into our searching and recovery
work.
I would like to point out it is not always possible
for us to visit every crash site as we have rather a lot going on and we
can’t be everywhere
at once. We also have to earn a living as well as pursuing our interests.
We sometimes have to make use of windows of opportunity in weather conditions
availability of a Helicopter etc so often there just simply isn’t
the time to arrange for us to get out there in time for a recovery, but
we always advise the teams the best we can. Time is not on our side as
soon as an aircraft wreck is discovered it is at risk from souvenir hunters
and also locallized scrapping, therefore we try not to create unnecessary
interest in a particular site. Being obviously Western in appearence and
behaviour a visit to these Islands ourselves would actually work against
us. I have heard recent stories of aircraft
still being scrapped even now which is a real shame.
Kurile Island Recoveries
During 2003, the Hunt brothers recovered World War II aircraft wreckage from Shumshu Island in the Kurile Islands.
B5N Kate Manufacture Number 5353 Tail 53-305
(H-305)
Abandoned on Shumshu, recovered 2003
A6M2 Model 21 Zero Tail 03-08
Recovered 2003 from Kataoka Airfield on Shumshu, Center section
/ partial wings only.
We salvaged a total of three Ki-43 Oscars which
are much more complete than our previous example, one is a late war version
and the other being an early variant this information comes from Joe Picarella
who really knows his stuff. I have a crash site photo of the Oscar which I can forward,
despite asking at the time of recovery, the lack of photos was a real let
down to be honest. Our other 2 Oscars where traded with a Russian
museum and where recovered much earlier in the 90’s so are in better
condition. As far as I know there has been about 3 or 4 recoveries made
by various people over the years.
B-25 Mitchell Wreckage
Regarding our B-25 it was recovered from Shumshu Island
where it is thought to have force landed, the aircraft being very much complete
but later being cut up by the Russians and we think also having the center
section blown up by a satchel charge. We believe this to have had an American
crew and have been in communication with the Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel
Office regarding this aircraft. The only real evidence we have is the engine
numbers, any serial numbers / data plates have long gone. We can confirm that no evidence of human
remains were found at the site, this is always a major concern of ours. We
would appreciate your thoughts on a possible ID on this aircraft. We plan
to make a display of this in our museum.
B-25
Mitchell Serial Number 4?-?????
Crashed on Shumshu Isalnd, possibly B-25J 43-36140
P-63 Kingcobra
Four P-63C Kingcobras recovered from Kurile Islands. Three have USAAF serial numbers [ P-63C 44-4315, P-63C 44-4368 and P-63C serial number unknown] and one airframe is yet to be identified
but am getting there slowly with a lot of help from CAF
Museum. The wings
which have been marked prior to removal as to which airframe they came
from are proving to be a good way of getting an ID on the centre sections
via construction numbers etc.
A-20C Havoc 41-19393
Recovered from Russia
References
Hunt AIrcraft Recovery last update March 2007 via Wayback Machine March 22, 2008
Wings Museum - About the Curators
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