Gone too was the canopy frame and the propeller spinner cone, along with both Rolls-Royce legends embossed on the Merlin engine’s rocker-box covers. 303-inch machine guns was ripped from its mounting. The starboard wing was hacked open, and one of the Browning. It wasn’t long before the fighter was suffering far more at their hands than it had in the arms of Mother Nature, which for 40 years had hidden it from scavengers. ![]() ![]() Newspapers soon publicized the discovery, and since the Spit was easily accessible, trophy hunters descended. Incredibly, the classic fighter still looked to be mostly intact. Finally, a series of strong coastal gales revealed the remarkable outline of a World War II–vintage Supermarine Spitfire on the beach. On later walks he saw more objects poking up through the sand. At first glance it appeared to be a collection of corroded alloy parts, and since the detritus of war is commonplace in that region, he thought little of it. In the fall of 1980, a beachcomber walking the shoreline at Calais, on France’s northern coast, spotted something unusual protruding from the wet sand. ![]() Long buried on a Calais beach, a meticulously reconstructed Mark I is once again in flying trim. Spitfire From the Sands: A Classic Fighter's Resurrection | Historynet Close
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