Military and Civilian Aircraft wreck research and exploration
Initial search of San Bruno Mountain for P-39Q crash site
My son and I made the trek up San Bruno Mountain today in the search for the crash site of a P-39Q back in 1943. I still have to check out some info from the South San Francisco Historical Society, but we went up to do a reconnoiter of the area anyway. The topo maps don't show slight elevation changes and the crash was reportedly only 30 feet from the summit so we wanted to get up there and take a look at the area ourselves. I am sure if anything was going to be up there, it would be a micro site, but that being said, the area that looked the most promising given the info in the newspaper and crash report is now the San Bruno Mountain Ridge Trail. Both photos from the crash report are horrible and while you can see a ridgeline in the background of one of them, and what might be houses, it's difficult to match up with all the development since 1943. The closest place it matched, was in the area that looked the most promising where the Ridge Trail runs now, and in addition, the ground cover is all dead grass, windblown down, covering the dirt in most places, and covering whatever might be on top of the dirt too.
I will have to make a visit to the Historical Society to get some more info, and then maybe get a group together to search the area and maybe someone can get a better lineup on the photographs then I did. It was foggy today, but you could see Sweeney Ridge and the ridge Highway 35 runs down. If it was foggy when the one revealing photo in the report was taken, those ridges could be obscured and you could be looking for something completely different. The hike is really easy, at least in cool weather, you can drive to the western end of the Ridge Trail and it's about a 4 mile out and back hike to the most promising location. That being said, there is another area that might show promise depending on the info I can get from the Historical Society.
The search continues for where Major Elroy M. Hulett lost his life...
Jeff
I will have to make a visit to the Historical Society to get some more info, and then maybe get a group together to search the area and maybe someone can get a better lineup on the photographs then I did. It was foggy today, but you could see Sweeney Ridge and the ridge Highway 35 runs down. If it was foggy when the one revealing photo in the report was taken, those ridges could be obscured and you could be looking for something completely different. The hike is really easy, at least in cool weather, you can drive to the western end of the Ridge Trail and it's about a 4 mile out and back hike to the most promising location. That being said, there is another area that might show promise depending on the info I can get from the Historical Society.
The search continues for where Major Elroy M. Hulett lost his life...
Jeff
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Permalink Reply by Douglas Green on -
Cool Jeff, keep us posted.
Doug
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