Above and Beyond: Recovery: Bataan
- By Ralph Wetterhahn
- Air & Space magazine, August 2009
A deformed machine gun from the Nakajima Ki-27 spoke volumes to the author (center).
Kevin Hamdorf
Two fighters went after each other at midafternoon on February 9, 1942, with machine guns blazing. They were scant feet above the dense jungle enveloping the Mariveles volcano on the Philippines’ Bataan peninsula. Sergeant Toshisada Kurosawa, Imperial Japanese Army, was flying a Nakajima Ki-27 “Nate”; U.S. Army Air Forces Lieutenant Earl R. Stone was in a Curtiss P-40 Warhawk.
The two airplanes circled, popping in and out of a cloud layer blanketing the peak. Finally the Ki-27, having emerged from the mist, slipped behind the P-40, trailing white smoke. As both aircraft approached Cogon Tarac, a spiny ridge that juts from the volcano, red tracers arced toward the P-40. The airplanes disappeared into the murk.
Reports suggested the two aircraft may have collided in the clouds. When the American pilot failed to return to his base, a search party was sent up Cogon Tarac. The searchers found the wreckage of the Ki-27 and thought they could see what remained of the P-40, but could not reach it.
Over the decades, attempts to locate the P-40 crash site failed, much to the disappointment of the Stone family. Stone’s younger brother Westcott, himself a World War II combat veteran, had promised his late father that he would bring his brother home. In 2006, Wes Stone, having learned of my interest and experience in aircraft archaeology, enlisted my help.
After an airplane crashes, aircraft archeologists deal with the effects of compression, tension, shear, torque, and their combinations. Every piece of wreckage holds a clue to the airplane’s last moments. Our role is to find the fragments and put the story together.
Spike Nasmyth, an American prisoner of war in North Vietnam, and Australian photographer Kevin Hamdorf organized a search team at Subic Bay. On February 6, 2008, I joined them and our guides. Our group of 18 headed south in convoy and ascended the volcano.
After five tough hours, two Philippine Aeta guides and I were the first to top the ridge. We offloaded our gear. I put on gloves and a hydration system and followed lead guide Eric Flores over the side.
Descending the 45- to 50-degree slope, we had to keep a tight grip on sawgrass or shrub. Eighty feet below, the ground leveled out onto a narrow ledge amid a thicket of saplings. There was a radial engine, single-bank, nine-cylinder, the type used by the Ki-27, lying on its back.
I could see no large pieces of fuselage or wings nearby, so the site had likely been disturbed. We climbed down and I eased along the escarpment in both directions, trying to define a debris pattern. No matter how well a site has been scavenged, pieces too small to profitably salvage usually remain. But I found not a shred of material in either direction.
By now the porters had cleared vegetation from the engine. Both propellers had separated from the housing along the rotation axis, indicating the engine was still providing power at impact. The structure below and aft of the hub had been shoved inward, causing the engine mounts to fail, and the powerplant had somersaulted to its final resting place. A .50-caliber armor-piercing bullet had penetrated the gear box in front of the engine and jammed, unexploded, between two metal plates—a 90-degree deflection. It had no doubt caused an oil leak, and the spraying oil hitting the hot cylinders would have produced the white smoke that had been reported. Until the oil was depleted, engine power would have been unaffected.
My guide found one of the airplane’s 7.7-mm machine guns: soon, the other was recovered. A member of a later expedition found an expended 7.7-mm shell case under the engine.
The main debris field began 10 feet below the engine. Just under the peat-like surface, pocked with volcanic rock, lay metal fragments, wires, and bits of cable. A shredded fragment of a main gear tire turned up, showing evidence of fire and bearing a single clue—the Japanese symbols for “Bridgestone”—signifying the tire had been made by the Bridgestone Corporation in Japan. As I cleared away soil, a piece of curved canopy glass emerged on end, indicating it had penetrated the soil with high energy. This had to be the initial impact point.
Nine feet below the previous finds, the tail skid appeared, jammed into peat between two boulders. Using my compass, I figured that for the skid to make its way into the notch between the boulders, relatively undamaged, the aircraft heading must have been 080 degrees plus or minus five.
Using the tail skid, engine, guns, and cockpit fragments, aligned in an area 35 feet long, I determined the fuselage orientation, approximate aircraft heading, and initial impact point.
The next morning, along with Aeta guides Gary Montemayor and his son, Noel, I outlined the area where I thought we might find remains. We dug by hand to avoid starting an avalanche. I found a boot legging, then another. A boot heel turned up, then fragments of a skeleton.
Meanwhile, guide Jon Mar Benito led a second search party farther up the ridge looking for the P-40 site. Hours later they returned, dehydrated, exhausted, and empty-handed.
That night I slept fitfully in my tent with the bones of Sergeant Kurosawa wrapped beside me. Outside, the wind howled while the Aetas crouched behind a boulder, trying to keep candles lit to appease the gods for disturbing the dead.
By sunup, thoroughly chilled and short of water and food, we returned to civilization, bringing with us the sergeant’s remains, to be turned over to Japanese authorities, plus numerous parts found at the Ki-27 site.
On Nasmyth’s patio at Subic Bay that evening, I assembled the Nate remnants. The barrel of one machine gun was curled like a pig’s tail. Its muzzle showed no abrasion, indicating that at impact, it had stuck firmly into the peat. The other gun had a smooth downward bend. Its muzzle showed abrasion, suggesting sliding contact with a boulder. The type of deformation indicated that at impact the barrels had been very hot. The weapon with the upward curl had been mounted on the right side of the engine cowl, the downward-bent weapon on the left. Reverse the positioning of the guns and you’d have to figure they had bent in the direction occupied by the engine block, likely an impossibility. For the guns to bend in opposite directions, the airplane probably was rolling right at impact. During his pull-up, the pilot was trying to align with the ridge. He nearly made it: 87 more feet and he would have cleared it. For the barrels to twist in the fashion they did, the pilot had to have been firing moments before impact. Kurosawa had likely been in a left turn while firing at something—the P-40? Since the machine guns’ empty shells are ejected through a chute, the discovery of the expended 7.7-mm round confirmed firing just prior to impact. Kurosawa then saw either his opponent hit the ridge or the ridge itself. If at that point Kurosawa had completed his firing pass, his nose would have been to the right of Stone’s aircraft when he saw the impact or ridge. In that case, the P-40 should be located slightly left of and lower than the Ki-27 crash site.
For decades, more than a dozen teams had looked for the P-40 in the wrong area. But before we could investigate, the rainy season set in.
After the ridge dried, I got an e-mail from Nasmyth dated Feb. 12, 2009:
Ralph, we sent Gary and 6 Aeta tribesmen up the mountain Monday the 9th of Feb, the 67th anniversary of the dogfight. They have found the plane.... I think this has to be Earl Stone’s site, can’t have been too many other planes out there within 400 yards of the confirmed Nate site.
On March 17, the search team and I began a two-day climb and descent on the Mariveles slopes. Some 350 yards beneath and to the left of the Nate wreckage lay the impact crater and debris of the P-40 flown by Earl Stone. We made some test digs, gathered parts to confirm the find, and notified the Joint POW/Missing-in-Action Accounting Command in Hawaii to begin the recovery of his remains.
The author of two books on search expeditions, Ralph Wetterhahn has appeared in numerous documentaries on aircraft archeology.
Comments (7)
Since the author had reached both crash sites, why were only the Japanese pilot's remains removed and carried back, and not the American's? What was the response from the Japanese Government? What was the response from the U.S. Government? Was there some governmental procedural glitch against returning the American's remains? Did the Phillipine Government participate?
AUTHOR'S ANSWERS BELOW:
Since the author had reached both crash sites, why were only the
Japanese pilot's remains removed and carried back, and not the
American's?>>
The American' remains have not yet been located. Two soldiers reported
finding the remains back in 1942 and burying them near the wreck, but
they have not been found.
A proper recovery operation at that site requires considerable more
time, equipment, personnel and supplies than we had with us.
***
What was the response from the Japanese Government?
The Japanese veterans organization which we work with and the pilot's
family are very appreciaative. A contingent is coming to Bataan soon
to complete the recovery of remains.
***
What was the response from the U.S. Government?
JPAC in Hawaii is aware of the discovery and has plans to conduct an
Initial Expedition in the future, but there are problems with terrorism
in the Philippines that have to be addressed first. Security is a
prime issue with JPAC, and arrival of a large team is not something
that can be kept out of the public eye, as opposed to our private
effort.
***
Was there some governmental procedural glitch against returni
ng the
American's remains?
See responses above.
***
Did the Phillipine Government participate?
No.
Posted by Charles Griffith on July 16,2009 | 05:44 PM
I read the story several times and too was surprised that the remains of both brave pilots were not recovered. I feel that this may be comforting to some degree to the respective families, but will not replace that empty space in their hearts that has been there for all these years. I hope the mission can be completed.
I love to read all things aviation especially military history and would like to read the opinions and ideas of other pilots from this era and in these types of fighters as to what they think happened. I suppose a collision can be ruled out. Could Lieutenant Stone's P-40 not out maneuver Sergeant Kurosawa's fixed gear Ki-27? Perhaps the P-40 had also sufferred battle and Sergeant Kurosawa got behind the P-40, either behind him on his tail? Could both have flown into the terrain during the speeds of a dogfight?
I hope some other interested readers will respond and I would like to thank the author and his party for a difficult undertaking that otherwise would have probably never happened. THE AUTHOR, RALPH WETTERHAHN, REPLIES: The P-40 has better performance than the Ki-27, but there were several
aircraft engaged at the same time. Once a pilot "saddles up" behind
another aircraft, he becomes vulnerable to attack from behind because
his speed and turn rate are close to that of the lesser-performing
plane. Thus Stone may have been chasing one Japanese plane while
another got on his tail. So far we have no evidence of battle damage
to the P-40, but the larger parts of the plane have been removed, so we
may never know. The Ki-27 showed damage to the gear box and exhaust
stacks, so we know he took some hits. Could both have flown into
terrain? Yes, but not likely as the impact angle of the P-40 suggest
it made no attempt to avoid impact, whereas the impact angle of the
Ki-27 indicates an attempt to clear the ridge. The steep angle of
impact of the P-40 suggests it was no longer in pilot-controlled
flight. There are a number of possible explanations, but one tries to
propose the "most likely" scenario, and go from there to other
alternate possibilities. That's what I do in the case of incomplete
evidence such as this.
Posted by Donald Price on August 5,2009 | 03:39 PM
Keep up your exellent work Ralph, I wish the UK government was as proactive in the recovery of MIA servicemen.
Posted by John Goodman on February 15,2010 | 08:35 PM
There was a report by an Army Air Corps Captain at the time of this accident. He climbed to the wreck sites and verified the accident. I think he stated the P-40 was either inaccessible or they couldn't couldn't locate it.
In 1947 two Australians found the sites and buried both pilots. Or maybe they only buried Lt Stone. I am unsure.
Tom McGeeney
Posted by Thomas McGeeney on February 20,2010 | 03:12 PM
Hi
this is a great result, finding both wrecks and pilot remains means offical records and family histories can now be completed and the pilots buried according to their faiths. Is there any information about the identity of the P-40 that Stone was flying?
regards
Posted by Peter Smythe on September 26,2010 | 09:46 PM
My grandfather served in Bataan during WW 2 and was a Death March survivor. He often said that he and his buddies would have had higher morale had they seen their own air force battling against these planes. I wonder if this Ki-27 was one of those he saw. I hope I get to meet the relatives of the pilot in a peacful get together. A pity my grandfather passed away five years ago this week and will not have that chance.
Posted by Jerico A. Parazo on March 2,2011 | 09:15 PM
Hello my name is John Mar Denito, I'm one of the search guide of the wreckage expedition. I'm happy that I found this website on which they publish my name as one of the search guides of the said expedition. I would like to extend my gratitude to the families of the to pilots involved in the plane crash. I' m happy on the response of the relatives regarding the outcome of the expedition. If ever they are willing to visit the crash site, I am in honor to guide you there. If you had any questions regarding the matter please feel free to send me an e-mail at johnmardenito [at] yahoo [dot] com. I am also very thankful to Mr. Carl Weltach, Mr Ryan Batch, Mr. Brad Blyth and Mr. Spike Nashmith for taking me on this expedition. I'm very honored to witness a part of this historical achievement.
Posted by John Mar Denito on December 4,2012 | 03:40 AM