NAVY wants abandoned Corsair back

[oboe]

Anybody know why the Navy might be interested in restoring crashed, abandoned WWII aircraft?   Do they have a restoration team?

Navy wants Corsair back

I thought once a plan was declared 'salvage' they wouldn't have any rights to it anymore....

[hawker238]

Slap some pics down if you find em.

[Mini D]

The Navy is going to lose that battle.

MiniD

[Dnil]

for some reason the navy guys are complete tulips when it comes to warbirds.  The let bunches of airplanes rot for no reason.  And sue anyone that tries to get to them.

The air force has a different approach to its abandon stuff, they pretty much dont care.

Last I heard the only known TBD still is rotting away on the ocean floor and the navy wont let anyone near it.  No one died in the crash either.


Now they will work trades with you if they need an airplane you have for their museum.

edit....after reading the story, the guy will lose.  I see nothing in the story where the navy gave permission for him to get the plane.  I forget the term the navy uses for all its old stuff.  Someone here probably remembers it.  Navy does this all the time, feel sorry for the poor guy.

[Tarmac]

Like a bunch of little toddlers.  They don't care about what they waste until someone else wants to make use of it.

[Pongo]

They asked for it. He told them it would cost them 5 million. They turn up the heat on him with lawyers that they have on payroll anyway and he has to defend himself.
Some admiral wants it as his name sake in a museum somewhere.

[Rafe35]

Weird.

Now, That US Navy want Brewster F3A-1 Corsair back?  I wonder What's US Navy going use F3A-1 Corsair for?
I know there some F3A-1 already in Museum and probably almost all of them are not flyable planes.

[rpm]

Originally posted by oboe
I thought once a plan was declared 'salvage' they wouldn't have any rights to it anymore....

They are the Government and do what they please.

[Hawklore]

If they want it back there gonna have to pay for it.


Because legally it's his, he payed for the salvage prices, the navy just didn't want to go to the trouble..

[Torque]

I'd tell them to pay up or blow me thru a barbed wire fence.

[Dnil]

guys, he couldnt leagally salvage it.  He has to have had permission to salvage it from the navy, the navy will claim it until the end of time unless he got approval from them.

I have heard of stories of the navy repossing TBMs from people then scrapping them.  

If he got permission he wins, if he didnt he loses.  

I want to say the term is imminant domain but that doesnt sound right either.

of course, you never know with judges and jurys now days.  I sure hope the navy loses this one and sets off a chain reaction to more recoveries.

[Rafe35]

Just found the news from Air Classic Magazine(Vol. 40/Num 11).

The Navy has reversed course and agreed to give the hulk of demolished Brewster-built Corsair to Lex Cralley of Princeton, Minnestoa.  Help came from an unusual source the US Government.  When Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) heard of the lawsuit he offered his aid to Cralley and asked the Navy to drop their suit and give the wreckage to the aviation enthusiast.  Jones wrote a leeter to Navy Secretary Gordon England in which he asked England to exert some "common-sense leadership" to avoid having the F3A Corsair become a "laughable poster child" for big government run amok.  

Cralley was relieved that the Navy agreed to transfer title of the wreck to him.  This happened after Alberto Mora, the Navy's top lawyer. agreed to junk the lawsuit.  "It was a whole lot more work to retain the plane than to obtain it." said Cralley who also expressed his thanks to Rep. Jones.

Depsite that and the pasage of decades with no apparent Navy interest in retrieving the aircraft, the service maintained in its lawsuit that it still owned the Corsair.

-- "Warbird Report, Keep em flying from Air Classic Magazine of Vol 40/Num 11"

Well, he is lucky now.