Hills Reveal WWII Secret (U.S. Flyer Who Crashed in India)

A village schoolteacher’s personal challenge to his clan’s fear of the unknown has led him to the wreckage of a World War II aircraft on a perilous wooded hill in Arunachal Pradesh.

Tani Bagang, 28, had heard legendary tales of how sightings of arre — “mystery object” in the Nyishi language — on the hill would scare off his ancestors. Ten days ago, he decided to see it for himself.

Braving snakes and poor weather, he trekked alone for seven days, losing his way once in the remote hill forests, before stumbling on mangled pieces of metal. A little further down, where the hill sloped towards a gorge, he lifted a veil of foliage to find a metal plate. A skeleton and four-inch bullets lay nearby.

The inscription on the plate said: ST 95T6 BLACK HAWK 7.26.1943SPMCO. The schoolteacher realised he may have discovered the wreckage of a WWII aircraft that probably crash-landed at the spot.

“My grandfather and father would tell me about a mysterious object that had scared them all their life. A hunter from our locality, Kasee Bagang, once sighted the wreckage from a distance but could never gather the courage to come closer,” Bagang told The Telegraph over the phone from Seppa, district headquarters of East Kameng.

“My family tried to dissuade me from visiting this remote site, infested with snakes and wild animals, but I made up my mind after performing rituals to ward off evil on June 10. I spotted the broken metal parts on June 17.”

He carried the plate, bullets and the bones down with him and showed them to district planning officer Vijay Sonam. The skeleton has been sent for a DNA test.

“It appears to be the wreckage of a WWII fighter that may have been lost during an operation. Another skeleton, and fragments of a pair of jeans, was found in nearby Yangfo village way back in the 1950s. We believe it was the skeleton of a second person who was on the fighter aircraft,” Sonam said.

Army officials from 5 Mountain Brigade at Tenga, West Kameng, have summoned Bagang to ask about the plane.

In 2007, villagers in East Siang district had found the wreckage of a US aircraft, B-24J, nicknamed “Hot As Hell”, that had crashed on January 25, 1944.

Several other crashed US fighters have been found in Dibang Valley, Papum Pare and Lohit districts over the past few years.

More than 430 aircraft and hundreds of crewmen of the US air force went missing in the forests of Arunachal during WWII.

Last year, a US government team visited East Siang and West Siang to prepare the ground for the excavation of known crash sites in the state.

CBI was the China-Burma-India Campaign.
When the Burma Road fell to the Japanese Army, a supply effort for Allied forces in China was initiated from India. War materiel was flown over the Himalayas to support Brits and Nationalist Chinese troops who were engaged with over a million Japanese troops in Burma and China at the time. Cargo pilots in the campaign were referred to at “Hump Pilots.”
The Allies needed to keep the Japanese in China while the US approached Japan via the island hopping campaign which eventually allowed B-29s to reach Japan.
There was very little news coverage of this part of the war effort since America's attention was mostly on Europe and the Pacific campaigns.

ECHO OF ARUNACHAL

US aircraft wreckage spotted in Lolum hill

| Dodum YANGFO |

ITANAGAR, June 20: An amateur trekker from Kesse Bagang, a remote hamlet under Chayang Tajo circle in East Kameng district bordering Kurung Kumey in the west, stumbled upon the wreckages of an aircraft that probably went missing during the World War-II after a week-long arduous trek through the inhospitable terrain and mountainous jungle path.

Tani Bagang, 28, had little idea about the wreckage, that lay in the wilderness set amid dense forest and towering mountain ranges but a determined bid to venture out to the almost inaccessible area enabled him to sight the wreckages. The booty - metal plates, skeletons, fan and bullet were recovered from the site which he later submitted to Army based in Tenga Valley of West Kameng district. He said following the words of his village elder, he started the march on June 1 and it took him a week to scale the heights of Lolum hill where lay the remnants of aircraft.

His troublesome trek bore him fruit on June 5 when he sighted the wreckages scattered in four different places. The plate with words inscribed ‘95T6 BLACK HAWK dating 7.26.1943 (SPMCO), a stained bullet, a fan and skeletons were found from the site. The aircraft belongs to USA which might have crashed during the Second World War.

This was confirmed by one Claiton Kuhles, a US citizen working in a research organization and is engaged in fact finding on aircraft wreckage, through an email to Advocate Chapo Yangfo, who is related to Tani. Chapo informed that Claiton, on his email, has shown interest to visit to crash site in the month of Sept-Oct next to unearth the truth. “When I was child I used to hear about the plane wreckage (then a mysterious object) in our hills. I also heard that some of our village folks made utensils out of that wreckage,” Bagang told Echo of Arunachal over telephone from Seppa today.

He carried the metal plates, bullet and bones with him and showed it to the district administration after reaching Seppa. The administration, in turn, apprised Chief Secretary Tabom Bam about the finding.

“Somehow, the Army officials came to know about my finding and summoned me at Tenga yesterday for further information. They were showing enthusiasm to know more about the wreckage and even asked me to lead them to the spot,” Bagang added.

This is worth mentioning that on earlier occasions also several US fighter planes belonging to World War-II were found in Dibang Valley and East Siang districts.

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