P-MAN XIV Update #24 - The world's most grueling and satisfying jungle hike. Again.

10 April 2012

My feet, one ankle, one knee and back feel like I just walked 6 miles over uneven terrain, up muddy embankments, forded streams (some not so successfully) up to the top of ridge lines and back down again. And I had to retire, after six years of faithful service, my muddy hiking boots. But the day started much earlier, without all the aches that currently plague us.

With our van fixed properly, we headed out to meet Joe and Sekarius at the KB Shell station. Sekarius is a hunter who lives in Ngschesar on the east side. He's taken us to this site before and is happy to help us in our cause. He says he found more debris above the current site. Finding new parts and expanding the debris field would be our secondary mission today. Our primary goal is to take some soil samples for analysis to see if anyone is buried below. One of our team members, Laura, said when she visited this site, pointed at a particular location and said, "that is the spot where I would dig for a body." Since we can't dig, we just sample.

But we had to get there. Drove the van up to the first turnoff past Yamato Bridge in Ngaremlengui. Dismounted our vehicles and geared up. Walked up the old "Japanese highway"...

The old "Japanese highway." This was the easiest section of our hike.

This rock marks the fork in the road. We took the path to the left of it.

...and through giant ferns and then the real work began. Raging rivers to cross. Muddy embankments to scale, not a single Japanese bridge left standing. Poison tree everywhere. Up hill. Down dale. Two rest breaks. And the 1.51 mile as the crow flies became 2.7 miles by the route we had to take in.

Joe at the Corsair site.

We arrived at the Marine Corsair and also found that hunters had been camping there recently. That spells trouble because you never know when folks will disturb airplane parts in the jungle. [It should be noted, though, that a JPAC recovery team did a formal dig here in the spring of 2005, so some parts have been "officially" moved since this aircraft was shot down in August 1945. - Reid] After a bit of searching, we located Laura's spot and it still had the oil cooler on it that we found the last time we were here. Pat laid out the flags for the samples, then we went to work getting our GPS point for each of 17 locations, taking the samples, labeling the vials, taking a photo of each vial over the flag marking the sample spot, removing the flag, and moving on to the next point. Did you know sticky labels don't stick too well to glass vials when it starts raining? This was Dan and Derek's first visit to this site. They felt disappointed because we only had a little rain, just enough to put non-water-resistant cameras away, instead of the buckets that normally fall on us

After all the work is done.

After all 17 samples were taken, we geared up and headed up the hill to a ridge line that Sekarius said not only had more parts to the airplane, but also some ancient artifacts. So up we went and what we found is probably what caused the airplane to crash in the valley below. Looks like the vertical stabilizer and rudder, some miscellaneous aluminum parts and maybe a section of wing (the tailwheel came to rest roughly below this spot, in the valley). And right above these pieces looked to be a mound that was not natural.

Pat with tail structure.

Part in jungle.

Airfoil section with ruler and hand for size reference.

We've spent some time on this trip hanging a little with our archaeologist friend Jolie Liston. She's the expert on ancient Palau and we think she's going to like this spot. Maybe it's not a crown, or a terrace, but possibly a platform along an old Palauan road and an observation point.

Dan standing on top of the 'observation point.'

Pat and Derek standing next to a perfectly cubed boulder.

The hike out is generally easier than in, but we're always tired so we plan on taking more time getting out. We were focused on the way in on the task at hand, but did a little sightseeing enroute to the van.

Rest break.

We came again to the fork in the road, and hugged it?
Yes! This means it's a level hike from here back to the vehicle!

A great Palauan hunter, Sekarius.

Is that a face looking out at us?

I can see Derek as a tank commander. Unless mistaking a rusted-out old car for a tank
would be disqualifying for that gig.

The vehicle Derek is standing in, and a truck right behind it, were parked in a revetment along the side of the "Japanese highway." There are many vehicles of varied types along the old road including a motorcycle with sidecar, a steam roller, and N.S.Ts. (non-specific trucks, some of American manufacture). We saw anti-aircraft mounts, caves and tunnels and I'm sure there's a lot more we did not see. For some time, the Japanese anticipated that the Americans would attack Babelthuap when the war came to Palau, so they spent considerable effort on fortifications like this.

We were grateful to get back to the van before dark, with another great hike under our belts. Thank goodness we can't think of a reason to do THIS hike again.

Derek, post hike.

Ditto Pat.

Ditto all of us.

Back at the hotel, we cleaned up, prepared the soil samples for shipment to Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and headed out to meet Mason Whipps for dinner. The Whipps family have been very generous to BentProp ever since Pat started coming here almost 20 years ago. The entire Whipps family gets what we are trying to do. Every year, Mason lends us a van to abuse and return. And he even gives us our damage deposit back. If we returned it without damage, I think he would be amazed. As he likes to say, "I know where you are going with it."

Tomorrow, we'll be out on the water with Kut to see about new piece parts down near Peleliu. But that's another day and another story.

- Flip Colmer

Return to the Progress Report Index