Philippine Journal

Part of the

Greatest Generation Aircraft family

of historic planes.

Day 4 the search, 21 February 2009

The phone rang off and on all last night. We passed out some American cigarettes and a few 100 peso notes (about $2) for information leading us to the plane.  Word got around very fast; the Americans were passing out money.  We told everyone that called that we would give them 5000 pesos (about $100.00, a king’s ransom to them) to go with us in the boat and take us to the spot. None took us up on the offer.

This morning the wind is up and our boat is sinking at the pier. We are defeated.  We discuss it all morning, but are out of options, we just can’t safely get to the site and dive and it’s a 2 day trip back to Cebu, and we lost a day in the beginning, so there is no tomorrow.

We elect to place the plaque at the site where we saw the engines on the sonar, take some silt and sand samples for Lynn and start the long jurney home.  And so it is done.  The plane was there and is now gone.  SSgt Chatigneys remains either were found by the salvagers and returned to the sea, or were lost in the clouds of mud kicked up during the operation and they never knew he was there.  Either way we will never get to return him to his family and will never know why he didn’t get out of a survivable water landing.  If any good came out of it, it’s knowing that the money from the scraps of 44-29586 were traded for food and the bare basics that sustain the people and children of Cadiz city.  No one got rich and I wouldn’t even say anyone profited from the loss.

It was a pretty quite ride back to San Romegio.  Everybody is lost in their own thoughts of  the search and the result.

Epilogue 24 February 2009

We got back in San Remegio and sat down as a team one last time before we would all return home and back to our own lives and families.  Each of us is a bit different than we were just a few days ago.  We talk vaguely of a return trip, but we know in our hearts, it will never be done.  We had a primary objective when we came and clearly we didn’t achieve that goal.  But a number of other objectives were achieved.  Tonight we gave Lynn the bottle containing the sand, silt and water from the site. He was quite moved.  He said it was worth more to him than a million dollars and it made him feel close to SSGT Chatigny.  He asked if he could divide it up with other survivors. 

We wanted to close the books on 44-29586 and I think we did that.  We found her final resting place and marked on the GPS and commemorated it for all time with a plaque marking the spot.

All of us, the dive team members, media, donors, organizers and backers. All of us can be proud that we gave something back to the greatest generation for all they gave to us, so long ago.Most of all we were the tool that allowed Lynn to fulfill the promise to return and pay a fitting final farewell to a friend and comrade. I think that is truly what all this was about.

Finally we all need to wish Lynn well and Godspeed in the upcoming year.  On the 10th of this month he found out that he will need to undergo chemo therapy on his return home.  We wish you all the best my friend and hope to see you many times in the upcoming year. We are there for you.

My thanks to everyone that helped in any way to make all this possible. You have my undying gratitude for honoring one of Americas few remaining WWII Heroes.

Sincerely

James W. Terry Major USAF ret

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