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The first-ever licensed excavation of a Second World War US fighter plane in Ireland has taken place in a Co Monaghan field.<\/p>\nThe first-ever licensed excavation of a Second World War US fighter plane in Ireland has taken place in a Co Monaghan field.<\/p>\n
A team including a Second World War aviation historian, Queen\u2019s University Belfast surveyors and pupils from Foyle College in Derry and Ballybay Community College in Co Monaghan, working in conjunction with Monaghan County Museum, retrieved the remaining parts of a twin-engined fighter on Saturday.<\/p>\n
The P38 Lightning aircraft crashed into a stony field near Castleblayney on the December 17 1942.<\/p>\n
The US pilot, Second Lieutenant Milo E Rundall, aged 22, from Iowa, baled out successfully after he got lost on an evening flight from Langford Lodge, on the eastern shores of Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n
He was returning home to his base with the 82nd Fighter Group, who were based at the US Army Air Station 344, Eglinton in Derry, now the City of Derry Airport.<\/p>\n
He later took part in the Allies North Africa campaign against Germany but was shot down and taken prisoner in January 1943.<\/p>\n
After the war he returned to his hometown in Iowa and died in 2006.<\/p>\n
Now his daughter Merryl Rundall intends to visit Ireland to see the remnants of her father\u2019s plane.<\/p>\n
Irish Defense Forces personnel recovered most of the wreckage in 1942.<\/p>\n
But, licensed ground-penetrating radar surveys undertaken by the project team along with both schools in early 2019 revealed that not all the aircraft was recovered by the military.<\/p>\n
The team were granted the necessary archaeological licenses by the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht National Monuments Unit and the National Museum of Ireland to legally undertake the dig and preserve the recovered remains.<\/p>\n
Liam Bradley, curator of Monaghan County Museum, said: \u201cThis excavation will be the final project in our three-year examination of the impact of the Second World War on our border county.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe retrieved items will be preserved and put on display as part of our nationally acclaimed exhibition The Monaghan Spitfire \u2013 Life On The Border With A World At War which runs in the museum until the end of 2019\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cOther parts of the P38 wreckage will be put on display in Derry City and Strabane District Council\u2019s Tower Museum which already proudly hosts the 2011 recovered remains of Spitfire P8074 flown by US Eagle pilot Bud Wolfe.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe City of Derry Airport, which was this aircraft\u2019s former base, is also delighted to be able to display a range of recovered artifacts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dig organizer and aviation historian Jonny McNee said the pupils were very eager to participate in the dig and find out what lied buried in the field.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe opportunity for the pupils to participate in these digs and talk to the family of the pilot and the wider P38 family in the US is something that can\u2019t be learned from books,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Mr McNee said the pupils were very media savvy and had been quick to use social media to get in contact with various interested P38 groups across the US.<\/p>\n
He added that the pilot\u2019s family had been traced to US and they had managed to get in touch with the pilot\u2019s daughter, Merryl Rundall.<\/p>\n
Mr McNee said she was very excited about the excavation and was considering atrip to Ireland later in the year to see the Monaghan exhibition and her father\u2019s former base in Derry.<\/p>\n
Ms Rundall said: \u201cI\u2019m getting my passport renewed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis dig is pretty cool \u2013 my father would say \u2018I just did my job; why would anyone care about my old P38?\u201d\u201d<\/p>\n