Paul Allen has done it again...



https://youtu.be/-K-V_ah6IIs

Really fascinating footage. RIP to those valiant USN sailors and pilots.

Wow indeed. All honor to the crew of the Lexington. Such a haunting and sacred space. I imagine more video will be forthcoming? They found it at 3000 meters! Others were also commenting on how well preserved the aircraft's paint is. Thanks for sharing.

Very interesting, and well done Paul Allen! It is amazing to see that, especially the Devastator in such good condition, considering it's on a ship that was attacked and sank over 70 years ago.

Sobering and wonderful.

RIP

Ok, I'm extremely impressed with the excellent level of conservation of the wreckage specially considering all these years that the Lexington (and the aircraft) have been at the bottom of the ocean!

I would not want the ship touched, as it is a war grave, but I wonder what the chances would be to salvage a few of the aircraft? At least some seem to be located off the ship, so you wouldn't be disturbing it.

the planes are junk. It might look pretty good, but they are junk

Not so sure about that, there have been numerous WWII aircraft recovered from Lake Michigan and restored for static display.

Lake Michigan is FRESH water.

True, but the Lex is pretty deep and there's less oxygen. Still, my understanding of this situation is that aircraft are fairly fragile re: immersion in any type of salt water, and it's been a long time.

It probably would be possible but at 2 miles down I don't know if it would be practical to bring the aircraft up. I have no idea how structurally sound the aircraft would be after first being damaged by the explosions that racked the ship and then the dive to the bottom of the ocean. I'm sure that if they got them up they could be restored, they have done more with aircraft found in jungles and even in shallow water in places like Norway. The depth might make it impractical though.

I'm glad they found Grandpa's ship. He never really talked about that day. I have his Navy Corpsman book that he went over the side with on that fateful day.

Awesome and haunting all at once to see Lady Lex, undisturbed for so long. Amazing how that deep water seems to stop time.

Some new images posted on The National Aviation Museum's Aviation Page. This is really exciting. I mean exciting. Look at that F4F, Some argument whether this if from VF3 which attached aircraft to the USS Lexington or a Yorktown VF5 aircraft that landed on the Lexington.

I'm thinking this is VF-3, was the Felix the Cat squadron in 1942



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+1

Do17 restoration
http://warbirdsnews.com/warbird-restorations/raf-museum-dornier-17-restoration-underway.html

It is amazing how well the paint has held up.

Some detailed into on how exactly the Lexington sank,


"Aboard Lexington, damage control parties put out the fires and restored her to operational condition, but at 12:47, sparks from unattended electric motors ignited gasoline fumes near the ship's central control station. The resulting explosion killed 25 men and started a large fire. Around 14:42, another large explosion occurred, starting a second severe fire. A third explosion occurred at 15:25 and at 15:38 the ship's crew reported the fires as uncontrollable. Lexington's crew began abandoning ship at 17:07. After the carrier's survivors were rescued, including Admiral Fitch and the ship's captain, Frederick C. Sherman, at 19:15 the destroyer Phelps fired five torpedoes into the burning ship, which sank in 2,400 fathoms at 19:52 (15°15′S 155°35′E). Two hundred and sixteen of the carrier's 2,951-man crew went down with the ship, along with 36 aircraft. Phelps and the other assisting warships left immediately to rejoin Yorktown and her escorts, which departed at 16:01, and TF17 retired to the southwest. Later that evening, MacArthur informed Fletcher that eight of his B-17s had attacked the invasion convoy and that it was retiring to the northwest."

If I recall correctly the circumstances of the loss of Lexington resulted in a lot of changes in carrier operations, damage control etc. such as purging gasoline lines with CO2.