Warbird Information Exchange

A group of professional divers have found Italian S.79 torpedo bomber M.M. 22293, which ditched off Greece on the night of August 4/5, 1944. The S.79 was part of a raid against an allied convoy of 30 merchant ships escorted by four warships Northwest of Tolemaide (today Ad Dirsyah, Libya).

According to the unit’s diary, only three S.79s found and attacked the convoy due to bad weather, claiming three hits on the merchant ship Samsylarna, which sank. Five aircraft made it back safely to Eleusis airfield, one landed on Crete, one went missing off Crete, and one (M.M. 22293) ditched near Argos due to lack of fuel. The crew of six escaped uninjured from the ditching and were safely rescued.



More photos can be found here: http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/t ... _in_M.html

With a wooden wing, there probably won't be much left.

I believe there's already an unrestored fuselage (from Lebanon) in Italy if anyone is up for the challenge of building a new wing.

Wow. What an incredible find!


Chappie

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Brrring. Dispersal? TWO SECTIONS SCRAMBLE!!

Amazing, but I think they got the year wrong. It must have been 1942.

Interesting that the steel bits -fuselage tubes, props etc.- are encrusted with critters, but the aluminium isn't.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

I take that back. It WAS 1944. A little digging in my books produced the info that this SM 79 unit was operating from Athens Eleusis as part of the air arm of Mussolini's (very) temporary fascist republic.

Great photos on the link - thanks for sharing!

I know the SM.79 is not regarded as one of the se xier warbirds out there, but I have always been attracted to it for some reason. I would love to see one up in the air someday...

Mike

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"So there I was, knee deep in a river I couldn't pronounce..."