Josh Gates Searches for a Missing Avenger Torpedo Bomber! | Expedition Unknown

In 1945, two Avenger torpedo bombers collided off the coast of California’s Anacapa Island.
One of them and its three-man crew is still missing.
Now I’m flying in an identical plane to investigate the crash and find the Lost Avenger.
This thing gets up in the air fast.
Yeah, it does. It’s got that wing.
It’s got a big engine in it. Really? Unbelievable.
Packing a whopping 1800 horsepower.
The Avengers, right, are 2600.
Twin cyclone engine has us cruising above the clouds in no time.
There’s a better view than this.
I haven’t seen it.
Oh, amazing.
This is sick.
And it really does feel stable.
I mean, it’s just an absolutely smooth ride up here on this thing.
What’s it telling you when you drop it?
It’s like riding in a Cadillac.
Up here, I mean, it’s smooth.

Affectionately nicknamed the turkey, the Avenger was built like a truck, and she handles like one.
Go ahead, grab that stick.
You can feel how heavy this thing is.
And I’m flying an adventure.
You can’t see it, John, but I’m grinning from ear to ear.
Somebody pinch me.
I am actually piloting an airplane from World War Two.
And John wasn’t kidding about the heavy stick.
This bird could use some power steering.
That’s older.
Unbelievable. What a thrill.

Okay. She’s all yours.
Very good play. Formation with this thing is a big problem.
The problem is sluggish.
That’s something that is really interesting.
Right? Because I guess every design advantage is also a disadvantage.
And one of the disadvantages of these big, beautiful wings is they really hurt your sightlines underneath you.
It’s easy to see how the plane’s design may have contributed to the accident.
We know from declassified reports that a squadron of pilots were practicing a newly devised attack called the Anvil Torpedo Maneuver.
Suddenly, one of the planes being flown by Dennis Russell did something unexpected.
We know that rules plane, the Avenger that’s lost, dipped out of the formation.
He must have had something going on in the cockpit.
I was thinking the same thing.
Maybe he was already struggling with some sort of problem with the plane, and that’s why he dipped down.
Whatever the cause, the aircraft suddenly disappeared from the view of the nearest plane flown by John Buckley.

So when rules plane dipped out of formation, Buckley would have had almost no ability to see where he was underneath him.
Yeah, he wouldn’t have a up.
Then rule pulls back up, smashing his plane into Buckley’s tail section.
He collides with Buckley’s plane.
That’s what causes the accident.
It’s strange that he would have done that because he must have had a clear view.
Coming up on Buckley’s tail.
He tries to practice going away.
How bad would the damage have to have been to the tail section to just take this thing out completely?
The elevator, take it out. You lose the ability to vertically control the airplane.
So you want to take 180 out of control.
Unable to recover both Avengers crash into the Pacific.
Buckley manages to escape.
But Dennis Russell and his crew, Ernest Williams and Russell Guzzetta, disappear, never to be seen again.

I really have a whole different view on this accident now that I’m up here.
We’re searching for a lost adventure, but we’re also searching for these three individuals to sit where they sat in what is effectively an identical aircraft.
It really brings it home.
I now have a better sense of how the accident happened.
After all, finding a wingman suddenly lost below you is nearly impossible.
As for what happened inside Ruhl’s cockpit that I’m less certain of.
To dive deeper into this cold case, I get back on the road and drive 200 miles north up the Pacific coast from San Diego to Ventura, California.
There I take a ferry to Anacapa Island and paddle out to the scene of the accident.

Welcome to the Channel Islands.
These eight lonely spits of land are perched just off the coast of Southern California.
They’re absolutely stunning.
But this could also be a place of wild oceans and terrible storms, which is why these islands are home to more than 300 reported shipwrecks and airplane crashes.
I’m out here to meet Project Recover historian Colin Coleburn, who’s asked me to meet him up there at the old lighthouse.
Now all I need to do is figure out how to get up there.
It’s probably an elevator out here, right?

Surrounded on all sides by 200-foot cliffs, the only way on or off the island is a steep and seemingly endless staircase.
You got this? You got this.
Okay. Okay.
Okay. Where’s the lighthouse?
Oh, come on.
Aside from tens of thousands of birds and a lonely Ranger station, no permanent residents have called Anacapa home since the lighthouse was automated in 1966.

Project Recover historian Colin Colburn has asked me to meet him here to reveal new intel that could make or break our search.
Hey, Josh, how’s it going?
Good to see you as well. You’re a hard man to find.
I know. I dragged you all the way up here to Anacapa Island because this is where the accident actually happened.
Right here in this airspace.
Absolutely. And I’m guessing that Anacapa today probably looks a lot like it looked in 45.
Absolutely does. Most of these structures are exactly the same, including this lighthouse up here, which was the Coast Guard lookout station.

Having had a chance now to fly in one of these planes, I have a sense of the way they were maneuvering up there.
You’re the historian, though.
How does history help us unlock this case?
I’ve made a pretty big break.
We were able to actually locate the accident report.
This is it right here.

So where was this?
These are actually held at the National Archives.
Wow. So the report actually reveals what happened to the two aircraft in the collision from Ensign Buckley.
His own statement.
That’s right.
You don’t get more eyewitness than a statement from the guy that was hit by the missing plane.
Absolutely.

Buckley’s statement confirms the second-hand accounts of the crash—rule’s propeller hit the tail of his plane, critically damaging both aircraft.
But there’s an even bigger revelation in the accident report.
There were eyewitnesses, Coast Guard officers on duty in the lighthouse, watched as the stricken Avengers collided and went down on either side of the island.

And the other incredible thing that we get from this accident report are the actual compass bearings and distances offshore where these Avengers crashed.
From the perspective of the Coast Guard and the lighthouse, that’s huge.
It’s absolutely huge.

And some Buckley’s plane crashed 300 degrees from the lighthouse about 100 yards offshore.
And so where is that?
So that’s actually right out that way.
Right? That way, Yes.

Okay. So Buckley’s plane goes down over there.
That’s a known wreck somewhere out there.
But when it comes to the Lost Avenger, the accident report says Ensign Rule’s plane did not recover in any manner and made a glide straight into the water about 400 yards bearing 170 degrees.
True. From Anacapa Island Lighthouse.
It’s actually right out that way.
That way.

This is kind of a smoking gun.
If this is accurate, then 400 yards out on that bearing, there should be a lost World War Two plane.
Right out there, 400 yards offshore.