Helldiver being raised from San Diego Reservior

[Saurdaukar]

Didn't see this posted, surprisingly.  Apologies if I did not look closely enough.  CNN had it as a front page story at some point yesterday.

Headed to Pensacola for restoration and display after it's up.


http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/aug/18/helldiver-plane-be-raised-thursday-morning/

Helldiver plane to be raised Thursday

By Ed Zieralski, UNION-TRIBUNE

Originally published August 18, 2010 at 1:41 p.m., updated August 18, 2010 at 7:15 p.m.
City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.

John Gibbins

City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.
City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.

- Courtesy of Jim Grant

San Diego Water Department official Joe Weber examines the canopy that came off the Helldiver in Otay Lakes on Wednesday. Museum officials said both front and rear sections are in good shape and can be restored.
City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.

E.D. Frazar shown flying an SB2C-4 Helldiver. Photo courtesy of Richard Frazar
City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.

Navy pilot E.D. Frazar before he boards an SB2C-4 Helldiver. Frazar was the pilot of the Helldiver that ditched into the Lower Otay Reservoir on May 28, 1945. Photo courtesy of Richard Frazar
City divers Kevin Tackaberry and Jim Miller checked the suction dredge.
Archives:

    * Recovery site photo gallery
    * Family members tour World War II Helldiver's crash and recovery site (8/17/10)
    * WWII plane's number doesn't match records (7/31/09)
    * Pilot's son hopeful for salvage of plane (7/29/09)
    * Local museum wants WWII plane, too (7/23/09)
    * Naval museum likely to claim bomber if it is raised (7/23/09)
    * Navy bomber intact but under sediment in lake (7/22/09)
    * Museum wants to restore WWII plane (7/22/09)
    * Salvage team to assess chances of raising sunken WWII Helldiver (7/21/09)
    * Search for fish unearths history (7/21/09)

CHULA VISTA — It turns out the Helldiver that was a "Beast" to fly also is a monster to lift. That's what divers are learning about the World War II SB2C-4 Helldiver that has rested at the bottom of Lower Otay Lake since it was ditched there by Navy pilot E.D. Frazar and Army back-seater Joseph Metz on May 28, 1945.

Divers working late today to dredge silt and mud from the plane encountered another problem. Taras Lyssenko of A&T Recovery, the Chicago-based company salvaging the plane, said the plane's lift points don't match what's in the manuals for the vintage World War II dive bomber. That could delay the raising and lifting Thursday of the plane from the South County reservior.

"We're not finding what the manual says we should be finding there," he said on the dock late this afternoon. "We've go to regroup and figure this out."

The public will be permitted to view the raising of the plane Thursday, but the City of San Diego has closed the lake's massive parking lots. Those who plan to attend will need to park out on Wueste Road. No spectators will be allowed on the lake premises.

And realistically, it could be closer to noon Thursday before the plane is lifted from the lake and placed on a flatbed truck. The plane will be broken down for travel and then transported to the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola, Fla. It will be restored and then displayed there. It is believed to be the only SB2C-4 Helldiver in existence. There are five other variations of the plane, including the only one flying. But that plane in the Commemorative Air Force is believed to be a SB2C-5, a later version of the plane in 90 feet of water in Lower Otay Lake. One other SB2C is in Greece. Another is in Thailand. One is on display at the Smithsonian Institute and another is at the Yanks Air Museum in Chino.

No tax money or city water ratepayer money is being used to recover the plane, officials said. However, city workers such as reservoir keeper Viviana Castellon and her crew are at the lake performing regular duties associated with the reservoir. And Nelson Manville, chief of the city's ranger-divers, has been overseeing the operation. His time is being paid for by the City of San Diego's water ratepayers.

The reservoir is "off-line," meaning no water is being drafted while the operation goes on. State health department officials are monitoring the water quality of the reservoir, and thus far, no fuel or oil from the plane has been detected.

Meantime, Lyssenko and other other A&T crew members were drawing up a new plan to lift the plane out of the lake. The crew is very close to having all the silt from inside the plane and the mud from around it removed enough to lift it.

Bob Rasmussen, director of the National Naval Aviation Museum, who has been at the Otay site since Monday, said they preferred to have the plane rigged and ready to lift tonight. Rasmussen said the City of San Diego is billing the museum for the use of its ranger-divers, and "they're on time-and-a-half tonight, and it starts getting real expensive (Thursday)."

The shoreline was littered with rope and straps for rigging, and air compressors arrived at 3 p.m. They'll be used to fill the air bladders that will float the plane to the surface and across Lower Otay.

[Saurdaukar]

Thus far, the crew has had to battle many obstacles, including a broken pump and very poor visibility at the plane.

“The first diver down can see it, but after that, everything gets stirred up and it’s strictly Braille diving after that,” said Bud Brain, 89, a member of the A&T Recovery dive team who survived a D-Day landing on Omaha Beach.

On the west shore, about 200 yards from the boat dock, Brewer Crane & Rigging out of Lakeside has set up a 170-ton Terex crane that will be used to lift the plane to the flatbed truck.

That area was mapped out by city of San Diego ranger-divers, who have been assisting A&T Recovery. It was picked because there’s a shelf of shallow water before it drops off into deeper water. It’s level and easily accessible, with plenty of area to work.

Once the plane is lifted onto a low- flatbed truck, it will be transported to the National Naval Aviation Museum, where it will be restored. The cost of raising the plane has been estimated at $125,000, and the cost for restoration could run as much as $300,000 or more. All of it is being paid for by the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation, which uses donated money to salvage and restore military aircraft.

At dawn today, A&T crewmen were devising a way to take the canopy off the cockpit off so they could rig the plane and raise it.

Pete Spear, of A&T, was peering through a SB2C-4 manual and trying to figure out how to delicately take the canopy off without damaging the plane.

The SB2C-4 World War II Helldiver at the bottom of Lower Otay is the only remaining plane from an estimated 5,100 built during the war. Pilots nicknamed it “The Beast” because it was so difficult to fly. There are five other versions of the plane, but none are SB2C-4s. Only one is still flying, a SB2C-5, that is part of the squadron of planes in the collection used by the Commemorative Air Force in Texas.

Both Frazar and Metz survived the crash that day, but both have since passed away. They'll both be well represented Thursday by family members who will gather on the shoreline. Richard Frazar flew in with his wife, June, in his 2-passenger, single-engine Glasair plane. They’ve been joined by Frazar’s daughter, Allison, who was 5 when her grandfather, E.D. Frazar, the pilot, died of a heart attack.

“My feet never touched the ground when I was around my grandpa,” Allison said. “I have fond memories of him, and I wouldn’t miss this.”

Robert Metz, who is Joseph Metz’s younger brother, also will be on the shoreline, with his son, Eric.

"I'll be there bright and early," Metz said from his Montebello home.

They’ll all be joined by a surprise visitor, Robert Kofnovec of Santa Clarita. Kofnovec plans to drive down early Thursday to be on the shoreline and see a plane that he often rode in as Frazar’s regular gunner. He let Metz go up for what amounted to be a joy ride that ended badly that day in May when the plane went down into Otay, sometime after 3:30 p.m., according to Navy records.

“It really was no big deal,” Kofnovec said. “We just grabbed another plane and went back up a few days later. Those planes were going down all the time. That SB2C-4 wasn’t the safest plane. But I never lost faith in (Frazar). He was a great pilot. We just shrugged that off and went flying."

So far, A&T Recovery divers and the city ranger-divers have hauled up numerous treasures. They have brought to shore the plane's life raft, a parachute and the canopies that covered the cockpit, the gunner's seat and the plane's middle top section, all three in decent condition and able to be restored. They also found a large machete, which likely went with the parachute.

"There are a lot of historical treasures on that plane," Manville said.

When the plane is finally lifted off Lower Otay's surface Thursday, it will complete an incredible journey that began when Frazar was forced to ditch it due to engine trouble. It lay there in the mud and silt for nearly 64 years before bass fishermen Duane Johnson of Pine Valley and Curtis Howard, a former Marine from Alpine, discovered the plane on the Humminbird fish finder on Johnson's Nitro bass boat. That was in late February 2009. Nearly 18 months later, the plane is about to leave its muddy grave where it spent over 65 years for a rightful spot in the National Naval Aviation Museum.

And when next seen by the public, it will be all shiny and new, restored for future generations to appreciate a critical period for this country and the world, World War II.

And for the family members of Frazar and Metz, it will close an important chapter for both men, brought together by war, taken for a wild ride by the Beast that was the SB2C-4 Helldiver and remembered now as men who fought for their country in World War II.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gcGTb9sdxa07XYC06QjVxtbIxs2gD9HN46B01

Mud delays efforts to extract WWII plane from lake

By JULIE WATSON (AP) – 6 hours ago

SAN DIEGO — Salvage divers say thick mud slowed their efforts to pull out a rare WWII dive bomber from a San Diego reservoir.

Crews will resume their efforts to extract the Helldiver on Friday.

After working all day Thursday, divers couldn't remove enough mud and debris to enable the plane to be lifted out of the water.

Relatives of the two-man crew waited at the reservoir's edge to see the plane that crashed there in 1945 after the engine failed during a training exercise.

The SB2C Helldiver is one of only a handful still in existence. If it can be restored, it will be displayed at the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola, Fla.

A former Army ranger who has rescued 33 planes for the museum says there is zero visibility at the bottom of the reservoir.

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

[GtoRA2]

Cool story. I wonder if they got it out.

[Megalodon]

Didn't see this posted, surprisingly.  Apologies if I did not look closely enough.  CNN had it as a front page story at some point yesterday.

Headed to Pensacola for restoration and display after it's up.


http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/aug/18/helldiver-plane-be-raised-thursday-morning/

No problem...
http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,290065.0.html

Should be up today!!
three different vids
http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local-beat/The-Helldiver-is-Rising-101170104.html
Vid #2 The day the helldiver went down
co-pilot's son
"he had no fear at all till he looked at his watchwhy was that"
'he had to go home and face the wife'
"for what why he was late "
'uh huh'
Classic

Yesterday one the divers ran out of freakin air. I cant believe it... had to go to the decomp chamber for 5 hours....
http://www.10news.com/video/24695356/index.html

the plane is up off the bottom ...air bags are inflated .... divers are checking all the parts and they have the crane in place... thay might pull it out today but they have to stop at 5 sharp ....it will be on the surface today.

[Ack-Ack]

For the longest time there has always been rumors of a WW2 plane in Otay but it was always shrugged off as a local urban legend. When Otay dropped to about 50% of its level, people thought they'd finally see this "plane" but no one ever did and it stayed as just another local myth.  When I'd go out on my dad's boat, we'd fish that spot off the docks because it was one of the better fishing spots on Otay and I've lost many a lure snagging on something there.  Our fish finder would show obstructions but like most, just figured it was one of the many tree stump groves that are all over the bottom of Otay. 

If anyone likes bass fishing, Upper and Lower Otay are great places and if you like catfishing, Lower Otay has some huge ones up to 100+ pounds plus.

ack-ack

[Babalonian]

Very cool, wish it was within an afternoon's drive or I'd check it out.

[Maverick]

If this is where I think it is, my Brother lives within yards of the reservoir

[Ack-Ack]

If this is where I think it is, my Brother lives within yards of the reservoir

The newer parts of East Lake around the Olympic Center extend close to the shore line along the south and eastern end of Lower Otay.  Frankly, it really pissed me off they built those homes so close to the lake, they ruined a lot of good access to some great shore line fishing spots.

ack-ack

[Maverick]

If this is where I think it is, my Brother lives within yards of the reservoir

Turns out I was wrong. My Brother lives in Spring Valley just a little bit north of Otay reservior and next to another one.

[Ack-Ack]

Turns out I was wrong. My Brother lives in Spring Valley just a little bit north of Otay reservior and next to another one.

Sweet water Resevoir, another great fishing spot.  Supposedly with a "monster catfish" that is claimed to be bigger than an adult human male.

*edit* sometimes the language censor on this forums bites the big ass, it actually censors "sweetwater" that you have to type it as "sweet water" to get by.


ack-ack

[Megalodon]

here she is being lifted out.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Site=C4&Date=20100820&Category=NEWS&ArtNo=8200805&Ref=PH&Params=Itemnr=1
still soaked in black mud, they washed the rest of her off on the tarps.

Awesum.

[007Rusty]