Warbird Information Exchange

It has confused me for sometime on the reluctance of atleast the Navy, or to let other parties, to recover aircraft or other vehicles with it has the remains of service men and women on it. As a sailor in the Navy now, I can tell you that if I was in a aircraft or a ship that went down I would rather prefer to be recovered and burried near family and freinds. And from talking with a few of my shipmates they feel the same way. Now i can't see why an agreement can be made between the Navy and recovery organizations the for the recovery of, in this case, aircraft that all honors and respect be extended to the deceased and the families during the recovery. And maybe a recovery can only happen when arrangments have made to insure a proper burial. Trust me I'm not to make seem like the aircraft presidence over the service men, but this is a two sided coin. Maybe operations like this could be made in two phases. First the recovery of the service member then the aircraft. The Hunley was raised a few years back with it crew still aboard, by a private organization. Each of the crew have been by now or are to be burried with full military honors. Now I'm not sure as to the Navy's claim to the Hunley seeing since it was a confederate vessel. But still the U.S.S. Monitor Turret was raise with crew still aboard by the Mariner's Museum. Albeit under the watchful eyes of the Navy. But what is the standard?? Seems as though the Navy has set presidence that War Graves can be recovered. So in the end I'm still just as confused. If anyone here can shed some light on the subject please do.

Shay

Col. Rohr
Thank you for clearing up my confusion. Alot of good information. Any particular reason for the British standing on WAR graves? But I still have one question. Why haven't the the sailors in the U.S.S. Arizona ever been recovered? Thanks again for the Clarification.

Shay

I'm not sure on this Shay, but it seems that I read something once about internal damage and the risk to the divers that would have to do the recovery
Don

The British policy is a bit more complicated than stated, but, as Col Rhor says, basically is let well alone.

This is a PERSONAL opinion - a reason may be that having fought for so long over the whole surface of the globe, bringing them back is simply impossible, if they started, as regards cost and numbers. Don't forget, the British forces have lost service men and women on EVERY continent and the Arctic, in their thousands in most cases. The numbers of US war dead as against the number of UK war dead is also rather different. Not a race to win, if anyone gets excited, BTW.

HTH

Col. Rohr,

In your first post you mention that the Brits declare plane and ship wrecks as war graves under the UNESCO treaty.

Do you know which treaty this?

Would appreciate further details if poss.

MTIA.

Many thanks for that.

I'll go have a look at the UNESCO site for more details.

BR

Laurie.

On the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor, part of the recovery problem that was killing divers, was that there was still huge amounts of oil and fuel that would catch fire or detonate, while trying to cut through the ships hull. The USS Arizona still "bleeds" today, some 60+ years later.............Roger