One of the articles says total production was 20,000. some crashed in the water and were never seen again, many more were written off with as much as possible recovered for re-use and the remainder recycled. I don't know what the total fleet was by war's end but 1% of total production buried in one relatively area seems suspect.
Another way to look at it is that 120 aircraft represents how many squadrons? There might have been that many squadrons in the area so it might be possible but how likely.
My other question about the whole concept is- what condition will they all be in if they are recovered? The climate is a whole lot tougher on airplanes in that part of the world than the Greenland glacier B-29 and the P-38 also salvaged from the ice.
|