Itanagar, Jun 25 : Two adventurous government employees without a clue about trekking scaled a Changlang hill to unearth the wreckage of a World War II aircraft that had eluded explorers for 60 years.
Tokong Pertin and Maksam Perme with tribal hunter L. Komrang for a guide ploughed through inaccessible jungles and found the US fighter plane wreckage nearly 600km from Itanagar last week.However, they could break the news of their feat to the media only on Friday after they returned to Itanagar.
The excited government officials immediately contacted the US consulate in Calcutta. A four-member team comprising US defence experts is scheduled to arrive in Arunachal Pradesh soon to visit the spot and retrieve the wreckage.
This is the first discovery after the US and India recently reached an agreement to co-operate in search operations for hundreds of US aircraft that had crashed in Arunachal Pradesh during the war.
The Allied Forces, of which the US was a part, had their base in Ledo in Assam from where the planes would take off to drop supplies to troops in Kunming in China.
“It was an arduous task for us. We had to trek nearly seven hours through dense forests. We lost our way on a number of occasions. It was really a challenge for us to locate the place,” Pertin said.
He had learnt about the “strange rounded objects” — the wreckage — from local Tangsa tribesmen during a visit to Changlang earlier.
“We had to cancel trips twice to the site a couple of years ago. This time, too, the weather almost played spoilsport but we decided to push on. We were determined to scale the steep peak nearly 2,000 metres above sea level.”
“It appeared that the plane had crashed headlong into the ground as its nose was buried deep,” he added.
The local Tangsa tribemen had warned the officials against venturing deep into the jungles, which they believe is home to an evil spirit, the jakhang.
The hunter, too, was not keen to venture into the forests and it took a lot of persuasion on the part of the officials to convince him.
The adventurers found damaged wings, the engine, and propellers with long blades. They even established the identity of the manufacturer after they found the word “TITEN” written in English.
“As a government employee with no training and equipment, we could not dig out the remains of the aircraft. On seeing the small-sized single turbo engine and propellers fitted in the nose of the aircraft, it can be presumed that it might have been either shot down or lost its way and rammed into the hilltop during the war,” he added.
0 comments:
Post a Comment