New Ju88 wreck found

[Andy Saunders]

I am surprised we are even discussing this as a possible hoax!

Of course it isn't.

I have been recovering wrecks like this for over thirty years. Why a hoax?

I would suggest, though, that the engine has been removed to another location and given some careful attention. The grassy background and the grey blanket cover give the game away.

I would suggest that the bright shiny bits have been exposed after the mag alloy corosion that would have been the rocker box covers and gear housing (there is no trace of this in the engine pic) has been removed. This is generally a white crystaline mass, and the metalwork beneath is often pristine - as here.

If its a hoax I will eat MY hat!

[Maximowitz]

Originally Posted by Andy Saunders

If its a hoax I will eat MY hat!

Oxby comes from Wales. Everything is old and corroded there, including the sheep.

[Larry deZeng]

Oxby, I'm on your side. If these photos are not "posed" or a PhotoShop creation, then why is there no evidence of any vegetation growing up through those piles of metal in the first two photos? After 60+ years, there would be trees, shrubs and weeds sprouting and growing right up through the piles. That stuff was found elsewhere, dug up and cleaned, and then piled where it is before being photographed. The only mystery is the intention of those who did so. Is it an attempt to deceive or was it simply an expedient to pile their findings temporarily in an untidy pile before being photographed?

I'm no mineralologist, agronomist or geomorphologist, but I think I have read that certain layers of permafrost have unusual preservative qualities and metal objects buried within these layers show little evidence of corrosion, even after decades. Could this be an aircraft that came down somewhere south of Murmansk? There's plenty of permafrost up there.

[brewerjerry]

Hi
A they say on the flypast forum...

' will it be at legends '


I agree with Andy.

As to corosion etc, I pulled an access panel out of a hole on the moors some years back it was mint, due to it having sat in fuel/oil for about 50 years, even had the chalk marks still on the inside of it and there was more bits of that quality.

it was rumoured there was a sunken american half track nearby..part of the recovery op..

cheers
Jerry

[Andy Saunders]

Originally Posted by Larry deZeng

Oxby, I'm on your side. If these photos are not "posed" or a PhotoShop creation, then why is there no evidence of any vegetation growing up through those piles of metal in the first two photos? After 60+ years, there would be trees, shrubs and weeds sprouting and growing right up through the piles. That stuff was found elsewhere, dug up and cleaned, and then piled where it is before being photographed. The only mystery is the intention of those who did so. Is it an attempt to deceive or was it simply an expedient to pile their findings temporarily in an untidy pile before being photographed?

I'm no mineralologist, agronomist or geomorphologist, but I think I have read that certain layers of permafrost have unusual preservative qualities and metal objects buried within these layers show little evidence of corrosion, even after decades. Could this be an aircraft that came down somewhere south of Murmansk? There's plenty of permafrost up there.

Larry

The wreckage has clearly been gathered together and put into one location for photographic purposes. The use of a silver birch sapling to prop up the tail is evidence of this. The engine, too, is at another location it would seem. Presumably recovered, partially cleaned/restored and covered over with a protective grey blanket. (I suspect the engine, when discovered, had not been thoughtfully covered over with a horse blanket by some itinerant Cossack!!!)

I have seen dozens of such photos of "recently discovered" wrecks in the former USSR (and elsewhere) that are of this genre.

I see nothing suspicious in these photos at all. Mind you, whoever has found this wreck - or knows where it is - will probably want a good few roubles to show and tell. Then more roubles to "buy" it, followed by even more roubles to actually get it out of whatever country it is in.

Having just returned from a recovery operation in Ukraine I am all too familiar with how these things work!