Wreck comes up for air
By Krisztián R Hildebrand
Jun. 10, 1999 - Vol. VII, Is. 23
While Hungary and the world were paying attention to modern fighter planes arriving at Taszár, a team of aeronautical enthusiasts were busy recovering a submerged Soviet airplane shot down over Lake Balaton by the Germans during the Second World War.
The IL-2, a ground-attack aircraft, was recovered near Balatonkenese, on the northeastern tip of the lake, by a team of divers, explosives experts and policemen.
The plane was discovered this spring by fishermen when their nets became snarled in the wreckage about 100 meters off-shore, said Colonel Gábor Máté, of the Museum of Military History.
Máté said the museum was "very happy" to recover the plane as existing IL-2’s on market are very expensive.
He added that most members of the recovery team worked for free, and that there were sponsors to cover material costs.
According to Máté, the Ilyushin IL-2, or the "Shturmovik" as it was popularly called, will become a valued piece in the Military History Museum’s collection as there are only four others on display in the world: In the Czech Republic, Poland, Russia and Bulgaria.
The plane formed the backbone of the Soviet ground-attack units.
About 70 were used in air-battles over Hungary. It was extremely robust, not least because of the armor that protected most of the vital parts.
This is one of the reasons why the machine has remained in a relatively good condition after 54 years under water.
"Wooden parts of the plane have decayed, but the body is in one piece and it is possible to restore this Shturmovik," Máté said.
Experts believe that the plane was hit but the crew had time to carry out an emergency landing and escape, as no bodies were found in the cockpit.
This is not the first plane to be found in the Balaton. In 1994 a Russian PE-2 wing was found by swimmers and in 1996 a German Junkers 88G-1 plane was discovered.
There could well be other planes under Hungarian waters, because metal-detectors indicate further objects, Máté said.
However, it is very difficult and expensive to determine exactly what they are because the objects need to be lifted from the bottom first.