May 28, 2021 • 58 mins
A critical clue leads to an island in Alaska.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
You're recording. We're on a boat. We're on the We're
on a fifty ft boat in Prince William Sound, the
Arctic Skimmer, and we are right next to Hinge and
Brook Island. The cliffs are rising above. It's a beautiful
sunny day and we're just about to turn into Poortn Edges.
So the first time I've ever been on the sound
and were an edges is where the tentster told me
(00:29):
he pulled the cess tail of around. So it's it's
really stunning right now. You can see, you know, distant
mountains with snow. It's completely sunny, very few clouds, and
they're just these like dramatic cliffs rising up from the water.
(00:57):
From my heart, media, this is Missing in Alaska, the
story of two congressmen who vanished in nineteen two and
my quest to figure out what happened to them. I'm
your host, John Wallzac. Our trip to Henchin Brook Island
(01:17):
almost didn't happen. We just got lucky sun, blue sky,
clear water, but only for about forty eight hours. We
had a narrow window between storms and we seized it. Unfortunately,
our boat could only accommodate four people, two captains and
two members of our team. So on October nineteen, I
(01:38):
flew with Paul Decan, our supervising producer, from Anchorage to Cordova,
a small fishing town on Prince William Sound. I've been
to something like forty five out of fifty states, so
I don't say this lightly. Cordova is one of the
most beautiful towns in America. It's right on the water,
ringed by snow capped mountains, reachable only by air or sea.
(02:02):
It's most valuable commodity, Copper River salmon can fetch more
than seventy dollars per pound. Anyway, when we landed, all
I had was the name of our captain, Andy and
his phone number. We had been so busy that the
details of the search the logistics fell to Sam T. Garden,
our research assistant in Atlanta. In the tiny terminal in Cordova,
(02:23):
I called Andy across the room. A skinny man with
a gray beard answered. We walked over, said high, then
went outside and hopped in his truck. Andy and his
wife see One run a company called Alaska Marine Response.
They specialized in salvaging wreck ships and cleaning up oil spills.
Andy went to Cornell, where he studied natural resources with
(02:45):
the concentration and fisheries. He moved to Alaska about thirty
years ago. On the way to the Marino where he
docks his boats, and he asked for more details on
why we wanted to go to Henshin Brook. He knew
the basics that we were looking for a missing plane,
but at my request, Sam hadn't told him much. We
wanted to keep everything tight lipped. But and he is
(03:06):
a pretty smart guy, and he figured out quickly which
plane the baggage Bog's plane around nineteen eighty. I said,
as we sped into town, a man named Bob Martinson.
Andy stopped me. Bob, I know Bob Amazingly coincidentally, Yes, Andy,
our captain knows Bob, the tipster who found the cess
(03:27):
in the tail. And like everyone else with whom I spoke,
he said, Bob's a good guy, a fisherman who spent
decades in Cordova on and off, a photographer whose images
hanging in a local restaurant. When we got to the
marina and he took us to our boat, the Arctic Skimmer,
I went downstairs for a minute, then above me the
radio crackled with what sounded like a may day call.
(03:48):
I ran back up, looked out a window and saw Paul,
our producer, sprinting down the doctor Andy's truck to grab
our recording equipment. It seemed that our trip would start
with a rescue saw one needed help. A few minutes later,
though Clarity, a boat was disabled and needed a toe,
but nothing dramatic. Andy spoke with the coastguard, then dropped
(04:10):
us off at his house, where we had the second
floor overlooking the water to ourselves. The plan was to
head out the next day, so Paul and I, with
time to kill, went exploring down a hill onto a
breaker jutting into the water. As the sun set, everything
was still and silent but for the sound of sea
otters splashing about and a few birds. We had dinner
(04:40):
at the Reluctant Fisherman, where Bob Martinson's photos hang, some
fitful sleep, Then the next morning we got up early,
boarded our boat and met our other captain, Mark, who
went to grad school at the University of Washington, where
he studied Russian and Eastern languages before moving to Alaska.
As we prepared to leave Arkin, Andy told us that
(05:01):
the town was a buzz a thirty three year old
hunter named Neil Durgo had vanished in the mountains right
before we arrived. We're kind of surmising that he's hurt
because he would have easionly meet it back on his own.
So if he's heard up high, then he's been dealing
with snow and super cold nights. He had, you know,
(05:25):
he had a space bag in a tent, maybe some
extra clothing or something. The search party is it being
out of Cordova. We talked about Bob Martinson and assess
in the tail he found. I know that the odds
are like one in twenty million that we're gonna find
this thing. But um, but Bob seems like a good
(05:45):
guy and it's Bob Martin said, that's what he's talking about,
the guy he's talking to. The Bobby's yeah, Mark knows it.
I mean, you guys, we all know each other. Big dog,
blond guy. I think he's a great grandfather or something
already better. Oh yeah, so so that's I mean, that's
(06:07):
why I took what he said seriously, because he seemed
you know, I've talked other people too, and study he's
a reliable guy, because you know, doing something like this
get a lot of crazy people that come out of
the woodwork. But UM, I thought this was interesting because
he was he's reliable. Where he found it matches up
with the roughly with the flight route of the missing plane.
UM and the pilot Don Johns, didn't make radio contact
(06:32):
at Johnstone Point and he was supposed to UM and
he did right before he entered Portage Pass. So most
people that I've talked to think that the plane went
down into sound somewhere between um Cortobage and Pension Brooke. UM.
And then you know, we were talking to Andy, and
I talked to another guy in Anchorage the other day.
There's this little strip of land UM near is a
(06:53):
New Check Andy? Yeah. That the airstrip, the spot you
land a plane if you're going to New Check. Yeah.
And that little stripple land Can you tell me about that?
It's just that it's it's just just a little strip
of gravel that connects you know, a more substantial what
would be an island if that was gone, UM where
(07:14):
the town of New Check wasn't. That stripple land is
um flat level, it's humped, but a nice uh smooth
surface for a plane to land up. Andy pulled out
a map and pinpointed the spot where Bob found the
tail in poor dutches. Around the corner, there's a long,
narrow strip of land used by bush pilots then and
(07:35):
now as a rough airstrip. Typically you would only want
to land single engine small planes on it. But in
an emergency, it's possible that Don John's the pilot, could
have tried to land here near what used to be
the native village of New Check. Or he could have
attempted a rough water landing adjacent to this strip and
tried to swim to shore. Remember Don made several attempts
(07:58):
to swim twenty three miles across the English Channel. He
was fit and he was used to swimming in choppy water.
And then I was I've talked to some pilots and
who looked at the weather that day, and they said
that the I think the wind was coming out of
the southeast, and so he would have wanted if he
was trying to do some kind of crash landing, he
would have wanted to fly into the wind um. And
(08:20):
the way that this little striple land is oriented is
is facing southeast. If you were coming from Cortage Witterer. Um. So, yeah,
So talking to Bob, like I said, it's been forty
almost forty years he found this. Um, he was studied
with his dad and uh, another man and or they're
both dead. Um, but he's he said, I went back
(08:45):
and reread this this morning. He said that the troopers
in Cordova expressed the interest that it was related to
the baggage plane. And you know, it's been forty years.
But one of the things that we've talked about is
whether or not he brought the tail piece in And
he doesn't really remember. He knows he gave the numbers whatever,
(09:05):
he might have written them down. Um. And when people
are out fishing, what are the boats that come bring
them supplies called it tenders? Tenders. Yeah, he told me
they might have sent it back on a tender or
that he doesn't really remember. Um. But he told me
that there were at least four characters and there were
six on the missing plane. And so the question is
(09:28):
if there were four characters out of six on it,
like you know, like you said, be a match too
to like. So, I think this is the best lead
as to the plane's location that I've ever heard, and
it's probably the best lead in fifty years. We also
(09:50):
discussed how Bob found the tail in the lead of
his net. Sam and it liked to run along the beach.
They don't always, but they like doing it. So the
idea is to cut them off with the net the lead,
you know, so that they'll go into the deeper part
of the net, and and then you try to keep
(10:12):
them in there, and then you curse, and then you
recover your net and haul them at the very end.
But yeah, the lead is normally the it is the
shallow end of the net. What what would that indicate?
Maybe that it was just the net was being Well,
that's kind of a grabby thing. I mean, it drags
up all kinds of stuff, you know, sometimes rocks, It
(10:33):
hangs up un rocks a lot. Help Uh, you know,
it's kind of grabby easily. You know, you could grab
it something down there that's point jagged whatever. I mean. Definitely,
a a tail end of a plane is quite possibly.
(10:56):
Don't I'm not surprised, you know. Yeah, what's interesting, I
think I said this earlier. What's interesting is he found something.
So it's it's like, even if it wasn't this particular plane,
I wonder which one it was. Well, this is a
kind of a uh pinpoints it kind of you know,
(11:18):
we know where he found it. It's a not a
big area. It's we know it's yes, and uh, it's
indicating it's on the shallow you know, near the beach,
the shallower area. So that's a kind of narrows it
down quite a bit. I mean. And when I ask you, guys,
(11:44):
so we obviously I know this is not the ideal
time to do this, so we're very lucky we have
beautiful weather today. Um, I imagine the ideal time would
be spring and summer. Sometimes a better summers in general
is better weather, but there's no guarantee ever, Um, you're
feeling June you have the longest days, so you can
(12:09):
make better use of weather windows and generally nicer weather.
I mean, so if you were to pick one spot
in the year, one month of the year, that would
be ideal for doing stuff on the water. June is
about as good as it gets, but it doesn't mean
it can't blow data any given week. You know, this
(12:33):
is a nice window. Actually, do you see the way
this wind is coming. Once we go around that island
will be in the league so we'll we'll be pretty
sheltered in there, and then this helps knock down the
swell that's out because otherwise you get wrap around swell
in there, and that makes it tough getting stuff on
and off the boat. If we're you know, doing that
(12:55):
getting okay, how shallow can this boat get it? I mean,
what is what would be like the minimum depth touch?
We can touch? Really, it's an ice class all. It's
built really thick. So it's made to beach so we
can drive up, you know, a nice beach rock. You know,
(13:17):
it's a nice, nice slope beach. We can drive up
to it. So if you found the tail of assessma here,
if if it didn't originate, if the plane hadn't crashed
right in this area, do you have any idea where
it would have been brought in from? Oh? If if
(13:41):
that would be that would be tough. You know. The
thing is that if I think of a tail of
a if a plane brex, Let's say there's some possibility
there there there could have been a bomb planet on
the plane right where that it could have broke the
plane of um. Most of the time when you load
(14:03):
a plane, you load all the light things in the
stern in the tail and including dry bags with your
survival gear and stuff like that. So if the tail
could have been ouyant for a long time and floated,
so the plane could have crashed somewhere else and currents
(14:23):
could have brought it in there. Or but a southeast
wind like a wouldn't have that would have taken it
elsewhere usually but um, but it might have gone out
and then the weather changed and then point in. Um.
But it's that's not a classic collection spot, like the
currents don't. Like most of the stuff that happens out
(14:47):
of the Gulf ends up on like Naked Island or
over here, like they don't. It doesn't go in there.
That's not um. It's like what it seemed to indicate
to you then that whatever plane this was probably went
down in that area, that it's a good bed, that
it's the engines and the rest of it are too
(15:07):
far away. But I could have drifted, you know. If
there was a part of a plane that could drift,
it would be the tail. A few hours later, we're
on a boat. We're on the We're on a fifty
ft boat and Prince William Sound the Arctic Skimmer and
We are right next to Hinchinbrook Island. The cliffs are
(15:29):
rising above. It's a beautiful sunny day and we're just
about to turn into fourt edges and then there we
were the exact spot, so that rock formation just right
off there. The around nineteen man and two other men
found assessment tail, so somewhere out here they were saneing fishing.
(15:53):
As we idled, we took stock of our equipment. Unfortunately,
we did not have two very important tools side scan
sonar and a magnetometer, which would have helped a lot.
We couldn't get them in time. But we did have
two r o v s, or remotely operated vehicles, small
tethered submersibles with cameras. If you've seen Titanic, you know
(16:15):
what they look like. They're used at the beginning of
the movie to explore wreckage. One of ours belonged to Andy,
the other to the Prince William Sound Science Center, which
kindly lent it to us. Tell us about this r
OV in particular, like what its capabilities or how de trekker. Um,
(16:37):
it's a it's a high resolution camera. It's the highest
resolution camera we have. Um, we're rigging it right now.
Kind of like a controlled drop camera, so we can
thrust and tip, but we're going to drag it with
the boat just so we can cover more area than
(16:58):
we could if we were stopped swimming around with it.
We also had diving equipment and a crane just in
case we found something interesting, Say the plane the r
o V. So it's in the water. It's in the water.
(17:22):
Um are we searching that way? Starts pointing the reel.
But I didn't make a difference. I can to sure.
Let's let's just let's have it go over at this
side of the poem means the ploy said this one
(18:03):
something like that at forty dollars. So this at that
point right there, that's probably what we're looking at. And
so around there this is that this rounded part and
then that jagged rock area that is that's probably this
(18:24):
And that's where he said he found the piece to
be right over there around those rocks. Yeah, yep, right there,
right where the r o V is now. On a screen,
we watched as the r o V descended. We just
had a jellyfish some one by the camera. Seymore jellyfish
over the years, don't they proliferate when there's always been
(18:47):
a lot of gels, but maybe a few more. A
few years ago we had a really bad jellyfish season
affected sang a couple of boats. They were so so
thick about a couple of boats. They the sayners would
catch so many jellies that they'd roll over like they couldn't.
(19:09):
Their nets would pack up. They're trying to catch fish,
and the gels block the the opening of the web,
and then we just roll them right over, so the
jelly can literally take a boat down. Are you good
enough of them? So you can go down a little more? Mark,
(19:31):
I can't yet see the bottom. Okay, I can see
the bottom. Stop. Yeah, so let's we're seeing the bottom,
which is a means visibility pretty good. Hasn't hasn't rained
(19:51):
in a few days, which would money everything? Oh yeahs
I don't think there's any well as all as cricks,
but I don't think there's anything really big so unusual
this time of the year to be able to see
to the bottom, you know, the actually winner that is
(20:14):
a higher better visibility because plankton is can be your
biggest problem, and of course the cooler it is less
likely they're blooming in the summer. But plankton is can
really makes things soupy, you know. As Mark steered the
r o V aiming its camera side to side, we
(20:36):
stared at the green tinted screen, water, rocks, plants, fish.
To minimize glare, we covered the screen with a black
sheet and crawled underneath. Much better. We were just doing
it tests above water. See this is uh there? Now
I'll come back and show you this. You want to
(21:01):
that's a sea outer hole. They come down dig and
get clams and muscles and stuff. What do you need? Well,
I'm just kind of curious. Should I come back? Um,
maybe just turn off the down thruster and let's just
see where it is. Are you using the propulsion or
(21:22):
is the boat pulling it? The boats pulling it? I'm
using its propulsion to aim it. Is it pretty simple
to use or is it kind of trucky? Oh? It's
it's it's kind of like a video game. You kind
of get you know, once you figure out which fingers
doing what, you know, you get better at over time.
(21:43):
But since my excuse why fourteen year old can use
it better than I could? Is it something that we
could use for a minute or is it? Yea, I
took control of the r o V. It is zippy.
It's really surprising. You kind of sucking in to be slower,
(22:06):
so you use the propulsion and obviously to aim it.
But does does it kind of stabilize on its own
if you just let go? Should be seen in the
bottom conservac You said, where the claw? Where the claw here? Okay? Yes,
this r o V also had a remote controlled claw.
(22:29):
How would I telt to see the claw? More so
this great same thing on the other side. I'm cool,
you're looking down. H It's not super the clause and
(22:53):
super quick, but it's quick enough. I don't know, it's
not quick enough, not for fish so much. Let me
stop for a minute and meditate on how bizarre all
of this was, how surreal. Here I was off an
island in Alaska, navigating an r o V as we
(23:14):
searched underwater for a missing plane that carried to U. S. Congressmen.
To be honest, I didn't quite think the answer to
can we charter a boat and go search for the
plane would be yes, this is a podcast, But the
answer was yes, so yeah. Anyway, for hours we used
(23:34):
the r o V s to search for wreckage. A
lot of eel grass, but no plane. Later, a change
of plans, we hopped into a zodiac craft, a small
(24:21):
inflatable boat with a motor, and started zooming around, taking
advantage of the ultra clear water to conduct a visual
search looking to the floor below, because amazingly, yes, it
was clear enough to see to the bottom, at least
in shallow water. We also landed briefly on Hension Brook itself,
(24:41):
so I wonder where they're um on the map there
was some like inland water feature. I wonder where that is?
Is that an otter's So we're standing on the shore
of Henson Brook Island. We're kind of on the edge
of the trees, and the sun is going down and
we just rode up in a zodiac boat off the
(25:03):
bigger boat. And so now we're gonna wander into the
woods and hopefully not get eaten by bears or this
is gonna kind of be Blair witchy when you find
this this audio. We didn't have long on the island,
but we planned to return back in the zodiac, escape
from Pension Brook and back to the Arctic skimmer. Exhausted,
(25:39):
we anchored for the night as the sun sank in
the distance. We spotted something walking on the beach. How
how far are we from shore? A couple hundred yards,
you know, I don't maybe more from him, maybe undry
yards from him. Him was a large brown bay air.
(26:00):
Where do you go? Uh? Do you go behind a
kind of rock or something? Now, so we've all the
four of us have been tracking the bear with binoculars.
I don't think he went into the bushes. He's just behind.
So is this your first bear ever? Yeah? Well yeah,
(26:21):
sounding like in a zoovia zoos don't count. Yes, this
is this is my third. I saw one in North Carolina,
on one in Washington State and the North Cascades and
the street the third, but the first brown bear. It's
an unusually colored one. Yeah, I got something. I was
taking pictures through the binoculars. Yeah, so I was using
(26:43):
what was unusual about the color. It had a blonde
collar and then blonde ears and a lot darker brown coat.
Oh wow, here you go. Yeah that was true the binoculars. Yeah. Yeah,
so I was doing that kind up. Yeah. So, I
mean it's a much better closer picture. Wow, I've never
(27:06):
tried it. It's it's hard. You have to stay super stable.
So I have to find it with my eyes and
then hold my phone up, you know, in the perfect spot,
and then try to quickly get some pictures. But I
got video of it too. After a few minutes, the
bear cross between two rock formations and disappeared. So the
bears gone. Now for a minute, I want you to
(27:28):
close your eyes. You're on a boat, vast body of water. Twilight.
You see distant mountains backlit by a fading glow, cold wind. Calm.
You're a tiny dot in a dark wild We are
(27:52):
were anchored for the night in Poor Duchess, not far
from where we were looking for the Thesessina tail with
r o VS. And we're a few hundred feet off
the beach. We just saw a brown bear walking on
it for a while and we were all just tracking
it with binoculars. And Mark's making dinner right now, stir
fry downstairs, and we're all talking about the best way
(28:13):
to eat moose and uh oh, what do you see
something moving on the beach there? It's black? You sure
the binoculars? Wait, okay, I lost it? Now what's it
in the grass around the beach to us? So it's
like it's like it's I can't see it now putting
(28:34):
that little rocky that lighter rock color stuff. Anyway. Sorry, no,
it's all good. And uh so we're in this. We're
in Poor Duchess which is sheltered, and we're surrounded by
all these rocky hills and yeah, I mean today we
(28:55):
we went from Cordova on too Prince William Sound and
all the way to Engine Brooke and into Poor Duchess
and we used two r o vs to look for
the plane. And um, then we we hopped in the
zodiac and the water was so clear amazingly and that
we just kind of did a visual search near the shoreline. Um,
(29:19):
we didn't see anything, but we also landed on the
beach and went into into the woods. But um, it's
really serene and peaceful. There are two other boats in
Poor Duchess right now other than us, but we're kind
(29:40):
of far away from them. So we're just anchored down
for the night with the sun going down, not too
much light left, and he's I don't know what he
needs to do it maybe talking about hope for tomorrow. Um,
so tomorrow we're going to use the r o vs
and areas that we didn't search to day and we're
(30:00):
also hopefully gonna go out on the zodiac and see
if the water is still super clear, if we can
cover more ground when the light is better, when the
sun is right above us. So we did it kind
of late in the day today and we we're close
to shore. But um, but yeah, So, I mean, we
found the exact spot that was pinpointed to us where
(30:21):
the cess and the tail was pulled up, and we've
been just using the RV sook around that area. Um,
we're concentrated in a very specific spot in poort Edges.
I mean, I'm excited for dinner. It's getting colder. It
was actually really nice today. It was it was sunny
(30:42):
and it was warm at points an hour on the
front of the boat looking at the beach where the
bear was a few minutes ago. And it's freezing cold
and we're hungry. That night after dinner below deck as
we fell asleep, this is what we heard. H h
(31:02):
h h h m hm m hm hm hm m.
(31:28):
So today's day two of our search and another beautiful
day's sunny. We just had breakfast and uh Andy has
binoculars and it's piloting the boat. Mark is on the
roof of the boat. We heard his voice and we
didn't know where he was, but he's on the roof
and we're gonna take advantage of the sunlight and the
low tide and the clear water to go to the
(31:50):
area where the tail was pulled up and see if
we can see anything visually and then also used the
r o v S again um to cover ground that
we didn't cover yesterday. So for a while that's what
we did R o v S a visual search. But
other than eel, grass and fish again, nothing well, we
(32:12):
did spot something. Yeah, So we're we're right off the
coast of henteron Brook Island and we're we see some
rusted out wreckage on the beach. We're not really sure
what it is. It looks maybe like it's part of
a boat. Andy suggested we head to shore. So John
at looking at that steel debris on the beach. It's
(32:34):
and thinking of the number of storms that have happened
in the last fifty years and pushed up up. Being
that the plane was aluminum and it could have had
there's a good chance that looking at the beach line
along this point, if there was something out here, it
could have got pushed up there. We're seeing a lot
of steel things that got pushed up there. It's a
lot heavier in debtsort than aluminum. So it's it's interesting.
(32:57):
I mean, it's interesting to think. I mean, at least
part of it could have watched up onto the shore.
Maybe not the engines. Why I keep watching it, but
there's an engine. I keep watching the line with the binoculars,
and I keep you know, every Yeah, there's another piece
of metal in there, and I can see where just
(33:19):
straight in from us under the sea. It's not a
big piece. But we have we have these uh Andy
has these image stabilized expensive binoculars which are really nice
because we can see pretty far. And you know, usually
the binoculars are shaking, but you press this button and
it stabilizes it. So's it's helpful. Mark and Andy Prepp
(33:42):
the zodiac. We have a radio. We have air horn
and flares. Che tim if you can see a bear
coming towards us. We all getting in the boat. Yeah,
we climbed in and took off. Yeah. Clear when you
(34:23):
get close. So the wreckage, the metal that we saw
is further down shore. You yea, when you do anything.
We're trying to get a little bit of shelter from
this shop. You probably fine, did you guys get out? Yeah?
(34:50):
And you can just specting that guy. You got some
rocks here, you're gonna be able to pop and go
if you want to go flos if your feet your
let me go. Ye rocks the lines. So did you
get out? M I'm sure, so's Andy? You like you
(35:24):
can leave him on too. I think it's gonna lead
mine on for now. Yeah. They're worm Yeah, it's kind
of just while I'm moving it on the wipe ust.
We combed our way down the beach for a minute.
(35:44):
I disappeared into the woods. John, Yeah, where are you?
I'm on the bear drow okay, okay. As we picked
up debris, steel would bong. We looked closely for pieces
(36:07):
of aluminum. The missing plane was made mostly of aluminum ore.
Coming up on more steel again, not a not a
(36:28):
fifty five young drum. You've heard of? An old boat?
Paul and I kept showing Andy anything that seemed remotely interesting.
So you're want to just pick up this piece of
hose here off the beach which we're looking at. It's
(36:51):
got some steel reinforcing and a braided core. Doesn't look
typically marine. It definitely looks like an expensive construction, kind
of shielded like it could be possibly aircraft. We don't
see any numbers or what makes you say that it's
(37:14):
not marine. How can you just just because of the
um you have a you have a lot of room
and marine compared to aircraft. So you would be able
to instead of buying a hose that would be this
expensive to construct, you would run it away from you know,
that had to get close to heat or some reason.
(37:36):
They had that shielded hose. I think it's worth saving. Sure.
Did you see about the MH three seventy guy, the
guy who would go around and uh like the Maldives
and he went hunting for pieces of the plane and
he actually found a few. There's the article in the
Atlantic about it recently. So this is copper wire. It's
(37:57):
all rolled up like it was a part of storage.
It was amazing what Andy could tell from even the
smallest piece of debris by the type of wood or
nail or metal, or how something was constructed. He could
say this is from a boat, or this is pre
nineteen and then here's our shipwreck, and it must be
(38:22):
past two o'clock huh. I think it is because the
tide looks like it's going down. Ye Oh, it was
old seeing this boat up close. You're telling me anymore
about it? No, it's interesting because it looks like careful.
Like I said, the nails could be sticking up. So
(38:45):
we're seeing these deck planks and a little bit of
the blue right back there on different to a well.
And you can see here the blue and in the
square nails and that deck plank. I'd picked up back
there and thought this this where is this a tank?
(39:07):
Guess this is a tank? And where's the rest of
the whole? Like is this and is that fish tote
part of it? I see there's a plastic coat and
classic where nails. Would they tell you that it's older?
They do? They do, except for pretty much Johnny Wooden
(39:30):
construction is older. After combing through the wreckage for a bit,
we moved on and kept looking for clues. Yeah, we
found us another piece of illuminum. You know what, it's
stainless steel in stayle steel. I guess is it's a sink,
(39:50):
the kitchen sink. You found a sink. It's stainless I
thought it? Do you guys? See John? Yeah? Right, are
I'm pointing there's something white. I think it's a rock,
but I can't really point. Okay, it's like rounded, I think,
(40:11):
is it a rock, I'm going he's going no, it's
I think he's classic. Okay. In addition to a literal
kitchen sink, we found a checker piece, a child's flip flop,
a car bumper, dead jellyfish, the carcass of an eagle,
(40:31):
and a ton of garbage. And I mean a ton
of garbage. We've essentially turned the earth into a rotating landfill,
trash and plastic everywhere, even here on this otherwise pristine island.
The sheer amount of trash made our job hard, so
much crap to sift through, but sit through it we did.
(40:52):
You know what kind of reminds me of Phoebe Cooper,
because that one kid digging on a beach found some
of the money. And it's just like that kid happened
to be digging at the right spot at the right
time and found a clue. And so you know, we're
sitting here like coming through shift wreckage and and garbage,
(41:14):
and you know one piece could be an answer. Then
for the first time, a piece of aluminum that wasn't
a can castings, but that's definitely a casting luminum casting
rubber hose. What is that's in the shape of it.
(41:39):
It sort of looks like a bell housing it Scott.
This would have been the the finished edge probably why
it was quated. It would probably against something steel and
then it would come around and I had another machine
off the back of the engine. It would just been
like a cover or that um they flywheel would have
(42:03):
sat in. We kept it and moved one found a
small strip of metal back there O that there stainless steel.
(42:27):
It looks like it was part of a clamp. But
what would be my guess, probably from a boat probably,
I mean standless clamps are used um to hold hoses, boats, airplanes,
(42:49):
all kinds of mechanical I mean, to really find something
that we could identify as part of the plane, what
would it take, I mean other than the tail number
or serio like that cowing you know that would turned
out to be Honda. They have a uh Cessna will
have a definite um right on the front. That's a
(43:12):
Usually it's a plastic piece that's I mean that would
be like a smoking gun. UM. Any any of the
chunks of a plane aluminum like that are riveted and
have a lot of different things. So if we can
found a chunk of wing, we would know that it
was airplane related, and then we could look back and
(43:33):
see by people that really know airplanes better, what type
of airplane was this um, and then maybe get closer
to the idea of could it be the one that's
a beautiful old piece of wood? There? Searching in a
creek nearby, I found a lead patch, probably from a
boat that sank. Again, if people will say, would would
(43:56):
chunk of an airplane wash ashore made of aluminum? This
is made of lead, It washed ashore, or you found
it up the creek from the high tide, so um,
Definitely things get pushed up. I think this was a
good idea. I mean, you know, given the situation, we
probably have a better chance of finding I think the
(44:18):
playing on the shore. I think so. And we're able
to search so thoroughly, you know, looking at the rocks
where the eel grass that was one thing. The the
r o vs quickly became tangled in the ear eel
glass gel grass. The the thrusters um and see it's
good we have you alonggo because you can identify off this.
(44:40):
I won't really, you know, barring something blatantly obvious like
a waning in one. Yeah, I still put these on
um places where we you know, we look at Okay,
that doesn't necessarily need to be repaired, but we'd like
to protect it. So far, so far, coming to beach,
we've only found one piece of non can aluminum. Yea,
that pizza that we found back there, right that, Yeah,
(45:02):
that was a cast piece of a Liminum too. We're
fairly starting that would not be from an airplane. Um,
the the engine parts could be cast. There could be
parts that are bolted to the engine that are cast. Um,
it wasn't it wasn't necessarily a shape that would preclude
(45:22):
it from being from an airplane. Might as well take
it back with us. We can take it back somebody
that might that's an expert. No more about. But um,
we're used in a lot of marine engines as well.
Aluminum cast like that. So the the plane. If the
(45:42):
plane is sitting somewhere under the water here, or if
it's broken into pieces, you think it's still be whatever's
left of it was still being pretty good shape. Liminium
doest pretty well in this climate underwater. Um, so it
could be covered with marine growth. But yeah, I think
(46:07):
it it could be. H what's it been over fifty years? Yeah,
it could be. I mean, especially if it's for whatever
reason it's entombed in mud. I mean, it might be
preserved pretty well. We're able to find it. I just
(46:28):
kept having this image with the R O V yesterday
of the tail and seeing that, seeing the number pop up.
But and we don't know if it We're not sure
if the tail was pulled up and delivered to the
tender to take the court over, or just the numbers
were transferred. Right. That was a little bit of a
Bob could really remember that. And I wonder, Um, I
mean the number might have been in more than one place.
(46:49):
I mean that the main you know, would have been
in one prominent place. But we probably battling right now, boy,
(47:26):
losing daylight. We doubled back, so we're about to get
on the part of the beach directly opposite from where
Bob found the tail. M h m hm. Sure, looking
(48:10):
for like a message carbon the cliff Bogs is here.
As the tide rose, we reached the massive rock formation
jutting into the water blocking us uh but yeah, is
there a way around that side? Uh? Well, I could
(48:34):
hop up on here, but I just don't know how
steepid is on the other side. It's manage the ball.
You might want to go down to Paul, Say, what
where are you at? I'm on the other side now
I'm behind you. Oh okay, yeah you, I mean you
you can go too that. You have to get on
your knees and crawls. Do you want me to grab
(48:55):
Anya you might want? Yeah? Can you just hold that?
So Paul is crawling almost on his stomach under a
(49:17):
big rock formation and he's through. You know, I know
it's unlikely, but when you do something like that, I
just can't help but imagine this thing collapsing. Well, I
was waiting until I was waiting until you got out.
So now how do we go? It looks like you
(49:38):
did get shimmy down the side. Okay, and like that,
our time on the island ran out. Your Mark, you're
still on there? Uh in the galley is waiting? Well?
You in my world famous spaghetti dinner. All right, Well
(50:00):
we walked up an appetite, were turned around, and we're
headed your way. So we'll see in a little bit.
Mark picked us up in the zodiac. You like the
assorted oh stuff that I'm bringing back. We found a
lot of stuff, but this is the stuff we weren't
quite sure about. Oh wow, wow, man, it's so pretty
(50:28):
getting water over the side. Change my socks when I
got back or suck only got one water walk flood. Yeah,
we found a lot from that one shipwreck whatever. It
was pretty cool. Old boat. I don't know, wouldn't beams
(50:52):
and planks, kind of square nails, definitely a little construction. Yeah,
scare nails anymore. Climbing up a ladder onto the Arctic skimmer,
I set down the debris I kept, including the piece
of cast aluminum, and I changed my sock for dinner
(51:15):
mark spaghetti. Then it was time to leave. Andy navigated
us out of Poor Duchess, but before he got too
far I asked him to stop for a minute. So
we're just off the coast of Pension Brook, but specifically
New Check and there's a really narrow strip of land
and we've talked to some pilots who say that this
(51:37):
is a good place to land a plane and they
use it actually now to land plane small planes. Um,
it's like a very long narrow strip of lands rocky
um sandy um, you know, and it's surrounded, it's rained
by the east. These mountains these really tall maybe get
more than like a thousand feet hide really high. Um.
(52:00):
But so if we run on the hypothesis that the
tailpiece that was found in Port Duchess belongs to the
plane we're looking for, trying to figure out, well, you
have this perfect landing strip, why would you have gone
around the corner into and ended up in Port Chess.
I mean maybe a few explanations. The plane could have
(52:21):
gone down around here and the tailpiece got dragged around
the corner. Um. Maybe the visibility was really bad and
don was the pilot was trying to turn around to
come back and land in this spot. UM. I mean,
there are different explanations. But it's really weird to see
this in person. I've seen this on Google Maps so
many times that you know, to be here with these
(52:44):
thousand foot tall mountains and this rugged, beautiful water. Um.
But yeah, so we're about to head back to Cordova
and we're leaving Pinsinbrook behind, and if we come back
here with more equipment, we would love to search this
area off this um long landing strip. How do I feel?
(53:05):
How do I feel? I mean, honestly, I feel good.
I feel. Why am I asking myself how I feel? I? Uh,
I feel like this trip was worth it because I
got a really good understanding of the geography of the area,
um of this strip of land that I've seen on
a map but I've never seen in person, of how
(53:27):
tall the mountains are, of what port edges looks like.
And when we went to the spot that um Bob
told us he found the cess in the tail, we
got a much better idea of where he would have
set his nets and where he could theoretically have pulled
up the tailpiece, and you can kind of narrow it
down to this very specific area. And uh Andy and
(53:48):
Mark helped us with that. So if we were to
come back here with a magnetometer with side scanning sonar,
we have some really good specific points in areas that
we could search. And then for several hours as we
zip back a break, no searching, no interviews, just time
to think and try not to puke, because the return trip,
(54:11):
for me at least, was rough. I don't usually get
sick on boats, but for whatever reason that day I
did nausea aside. I stepped out of the cabin onto
the deck multiple times, wearing a life vest, gripping rails,
watching islands and mountains vanished behind us, bathed by a
striking sunset, fiery reds and oranges giving away to cool
(54:33):
blues and paints. As darkness fell, we pulled into Cordova.
(54:57):
Now there's something I need to tell you, something I
haven't told you. The day before, while we were on
the water, out of cell range, or so we thought,
Andy's phone buzzed once. It was a text with bad news.
That day at exactly one pm, about ninety minutes after
(55:18):
we got to Poor Dutch's, an Army National Guard unit
in the mountains near Cordova found the body of Neil Durko,
the thirty three year old hunter who disappeared right before
we got to town. Durko fell down a steep shoot
and died. Because such as Alaska, a place where so
many fine meaning and others die young, where sometimes amateurs
(55:40):
survive and experts don't, where hunters are found and congressmen aren't.
(56:00):
Next time on missing in Alaska this week for your
(56:30):
task something fun. Google Alaska shore Zone. Shore Zone is
a free interactive mapping system that, among other things, allows
you to explore seventy thousand miles of shoreline in Alaska.
Click on a spot and you can see photos, videos, etcetera.
Go zoom around, visit tension Brooke, who knows maybe you'll
(56:51):
spot something interesting. You can reach us by phone at
one eight three three M I A tips that's one
eight three three say four to eight four seven seven
again one eight three three six four to eight four
seven seven, or you can reach us via email at
(57:12):
tips at iHeart media dot com. That's tips, T I
P S at iHeart media dot com. Ben Bollen is
our executive producer. Paul Decan is our supervising producer, Chris
Brown is our assistant producer, Seth Nicholas Johnson is our producer.
Sam T. Garden is our research assistant. And I'm your
(57:32):
host and executive producer, John Wallsack. You can find me
on Twitter at at John wallzac j O n W
A l c z A K. Special thanks to our
captains Andy and Mark, and to Bob Martinson. A big
thank you also to the Prince William Sound Science Center
and specifically Scott Pega. Their website is p w S
(57:55):
sc dot org. If you can go donate there are
a great nonprofit. Finally, when this wretched pandemic passes, please
visit Cordova. You won't regret it. Trust me for now, though,
support the fisherman. If you can afford it, try some
Copper River salmon. People say it's the best salmon in
the world. Missing in Alaska is a co production of
(58:18):
I Heart Media and Greenford Media.
You're recording. We're on a boat. We're on the We're
on a fifty ft boat in Prince William Sound, the
Arctic Skimmer, and we are right next to Hinge and
Brook Island. The cliffs are rising above. It's a beautiful
sunny day and we're just about to turn into Poortn Edges.
So the first time I've ever been on the sound
and were an edges is where the tentster told me
(00:29):
he pulled the cess tail of around. So it's it's
really stunning right now. You can see, you know, distant
mountains with snow. It's completely sunny, very few clouds, and
they're just these like dramatic cliffs rising up from the water.
(00:57):
From my heart, media, this is Missing in Alaska, the
story of two congressmen who vanished in nineteen two and
my quest to figure out what happened to them. I'm
your host, John Wallzac. Our trip to Henchin Brook Island
(01:17):
almost didn't happen. We just got lucky sun, blue sky,
clear water, but only for about forty eight hours. We
had a narrow window between storms and we seized it. Unfortunately,
our boat could only accommodate four people, two captains and
two members of our team. So on October nineteen, I
(01:38):
flew with Paul Decan, our supervising producer, from Anchorage to Cordova,
a small fishing town on Prince William Sound. I've been
to something like forty five out of fifty states, so
I don't say this lightly. Cordova is one of the
most beautiful towns in America. It's right on the water,
ringed by snow capped mountains, reachable only by air or sea.
(02:02):
It's most valuable commodity, Copper River salmon can fetch more
than seventy dollars per pound. Anyway, when we landed, all
I had was the name of our captain, Andy and
his phone number. We had been so busy that the
details of the search the logistics fell to Sam T. Garden,
our research assistant in Atlanta. In the tiny terminal in Cordova,
(02:23):
I called Andy across the room. A skinny man with
a gray beard answered. We walked over, said high, then
went outside and hopped in his truck. Andy and his
wife see One run a company called Alaska Marine Response.
They specialized in salvaging wreck ships and cleaning up oil spills.
Andy went to Cornell, where he studied natural resources with
(02:45):
the concentration and fisheries. He moved to Alaska about thirty
years ago. On the way to the Marino where he
docks his boats, and he asked for more details on
why we wanted to go to Henshin Brook. He knew
the basics that we were looking for a missing plane,
but at my request, Sam hadn't told him much. We
wanted to keep everything tight lipped. But and he is
(03:06):
a pretty smart guy, and he figured out quickly which
plane the baggage Bog's plane around nineteen eighty. I said,
as we sped into town, a man named Bob Martinson.
Andy stopped me. Bob, I know Bob Amazingly coincidentally, Yes, Andy,
our captain knows Bob, the tipster who found the cess
(03:27):
in the tail. And like everyone else with whom I spoke,
he said, Bob's a good guy, a fisherman who spent
decades in Cordova on and off, a photographer whose images
hanging in a local restaurant. When we got to the
marina and he took us to our boat, the Arctic Skimmer,
I went downstairs for a minute, then above me the
radio crackled with what sounded like a may day call.
(03:48):
I ran back up, looked out a window and saw Paul,
our producer, sprinting down the doctor Andy's truck to grab
our recording equipment. It seemed that our trip would start
with a rescue saw one needed help. A few minutes later,
though Clarity, a boat was disabled and needed a toe,
but nothing dramatic. Andy spoke with the coastguard, then dropped
(04:10):
us off at his house, where we had the second
floor overlooking the water to ourselves. The plan was to
head out the next day, so Paul and I, with
time to kill, went exploring down a hill onto a
breaker jutting into the water. As the sun set, everything
was still and silent but for the sound of sea
otters splashing about and a few birds. We had dinner
(04:40):
at the Reluctant Fisherman, where Bob Martinson's photos hang, some
fitful sleep, Then the next morning we got up early,
boarded our boat and met our other captain, Mark, who
went to grad school at the University of Washington, where
he studied Russian and Eastern languages before moving to Alaska.
As we prepared to leave Arkin, Andy told us that
(05:01):
the town was a buzz a thirty three year old
hunter named Neil Durgo had vanished in the mountains right
before we arrived. We're kind of surmising that he's hurt
because he would have easionly meet it back on his own.
So if he's heard up high, then he's been dealing
with snow and super cold nights. He had, you know,
(05:25):
he had a space bag in a tent, maybe some
extra clothing or something. The search party is it being
out of Cordova. We talked about Bob Martinson and assess
in the tail he found. I know that the odds
are like one in twenty million that we're gonna find
this thing. But um, but Bob seems like a good
(05:45):
guy and it's Bob Martin said, that's what he's talking about,
the guy he's talking to. The Bobby's yeah, Mark knows it.
I mean, you guys, we all know each other. Big dog,
blond guy. I think he's a great grandfather or something
already better. Oh yeah, so so that's I mean, that's
(06:07):
why I took what he said seriously, because he seemed
you know, I've talked other people too, and study he's
a reliable guy, because you know, doing something like this
get a lot of crazy people that come out of
the woodwork. But UM, I thought this was interesting because
he was he's reliable. Where he found it matches up
with the roughly with the flight route of the missing plane.
UM and the pilot Don Johns, didn't make radio contact
(06:32):
at Johnstone Point and he was supposed to UM and
he did right before he entered Portage Pass. So most
people that I've talked to think that the plane went
down into sound somewhere between um Cortobage and Pension Brooke. UM.
And then you know, we were talking to Andy, and
I talked to another guy in Anchorage the other day.
There's this little strip of land UM near is a
(06:53):
New Check Andy? Yeah. That the airstrip, the spot you
land a plane if you're going to New Check. Yeah.
And that little stripple land Can you tell me about that?
It's just that it's it's just just a little strip
of gravel that connects you know, a more substantial what
would be an island if that was gone, UM where
(07:14):
the town of New Check wasn't. That stripple land is
um flat level, it's humped, but a nice uh smooth
surface for a plane to land up. Andy pulled out
a map and pinpointed the spot where Bob found the
tail in poor dutches. Around the corner, there's a long,
narrow strip of land used by bush pilots then and
(07:35):
now as a rough airstrip. Typically you would only want
to land single engine small planes on it. But in
an emergency, it's possible that Don John's the pilot, could
have tried to land here near what used to be
the native village of New Check. Or he could have
attempted a rough water landing adjacent to this strip and
tried to swim to shore. Remember Don made several attempts
(07:58):
to swim twenty three miles across the English Channel. He
was fit and he was used to swimming in choppy water.
And then I was I've talked to some pilots and
who looked at the weather that day, and they said
that the I think the wind was coming out of
the southeast, and so he would have wanted if he
was trying to do some kind of crash landing, he
would have wanted to fly into the wind um. And
(08:20):
the way that this little striple land is oriented is
is facing southeast. If you were coming from Cortage Witterer. Um. So, yeah,
So talking to Bob, like I said, it's been forty
almost forty years he found this. Um, he was studied
with his dad and uh, another man and or they're
both dead. Um, but he's he said, I went back
(08:45):
and reread this this morning. He said that the troopers
in Cordova expressed the interest that it was related to
the baggage plane. And you know, it's been forty years.
But one of the things that we've talked about is
whether or not he brought the tail piece in And
he doesn't really remember. He knows he gave the numbers whatever,
(09:05):
he might have written them down. Um. And when people
are out fishing, what are the boats that come bring
them supplies called it tenders? Tenders. Yeah, he told me
they might have sent it back on a tender or
that he doesn't really remember. Um. But he told me
that there were at least four characters and there were
six on the missing plane. And so the question is
(09:28):
if there were four characters out of six on it,
like you know, like you said, be a match too
to like. So, I think this is the best lead
as to the plane's location that I've ever heard, and
it's probably the best lead in fifty years. We also
(09:50):
discussed how Bob found the tail in the lead of
his net. Sam and it liked to run along the beach.
They don't always, but they like doing it. So the
idea is to cut them off with the net the lead,
you know, so that they'll go into the deeper part
of the net, and and then you try to keep
(10:12):
them in there, and then you curse, and then you
recover your net and haul them at the very end.
But yeah, the lead is normally the it is the
shallow end of the net. What what would that indicate?
Maybe that it was just the net was being Well,
that's kind of a grabby thing. I mean, it drags
up all kinds of stuff, you know, sometimes rocks, It
(10:33):
hangs up un rocks a lot. Help Uh, you know,
it's kind of grabby easily. You know, you could grab
it something down there that's point jagged whatever. I mean. Definitely,
a a tail end of a plane is quite possibly.
(10:56):
Don't I'm not surprised, you know. Yeah, what's interesting, I
think I said this earlier. What's interesting is he found something.
So it's it's like, even if it wasn't this particular plane,
I wonder which one it was. Well, this is a
kind of a uh pinpoints it kind of you know,
(11:18):
we know where he found it. It's a not a
big area. It's we know it's yes, and uh, it's
indicating it's on the shallow you know, near the beach,
the shallower area. So that's a kind of narrows it
down quite a bit. I mean. And when I ask you, guys,
(11:44):
so we obviously I know this is not the ideal
time to do this, so we're very lucky we have
beautiful weather today. Um, I imagine the ideal time would
be spring and summer. Sometimes a better summers in general
is better weather, but there's no guarantee ever, Um, you're
feeling June you have the longest days, so you can
(12:09):
make better use of weather windows and generally nicer weather.
I mean, so if you were to pick one spot
in the year, one month of the year, that would
be ideal for doing stuff on the water. June is
about as good as it gets, but it doesn't mean
it can't blow data any given week. You know, this
(12:33):
is a nice window. Actually, do you see the way
this wind is coming. Once we go around that island
will be in the league so we'll we'll be pretty
sheltered in there, and then this helps knock down the
swell that's out because otherwise you get wrap around swell
in there, and that makes it tough getting stuff on
and off the boat. If we're you know, doing that
(12:55):
getting okay, how shallow can this boat get it? I mean,
what is what would be like the minimum depth touch?
We can touch? Really, it's an ice class all. It's
built really thick. So it's made to beach so we
can drive up, you know, a nice beach rock. You know,
(13:17):
it's a nice, nice slope beach. We can drive up
to it. So if you found the tail of assessma here,
if if it didn't originate, if the plane hadn't crashed
right in this area, do you have any idea where
it would have been brought in from? Oh? If if
(13:41):
that would be that would be tough. You know. The
thing is that if I think of a tail of
a if a plane brex, Let's say there's some possibility
there there there could have been a bomb planet on
the plane right where that it could have broke the
plane of um. Most of the time when you load
(14:03):
a plane, you load all the light things in the
stern in the tail and including dry bags with your
survival gear and stuff like that. So if the tail
could have been ouyant for a long time and floated,
so the plane could have crashed somewhere else and currents
(14:23):
could have brought it in there. Or but a southeast
wind like a wouldn't have that would have taken it
elsewhere usually but um, but it might have gone out
and then the weather changed and then point in. Um.
But it's that's not a classic collection spot, like the
currents don't. Like most of the stuff that happens out
(14:47):
of the Gulf ends up on like Naked Island or
over here, like they don't. It doesn't go in there.
That's not um. It's like what it seemed to indicate
to you then that whatever plane this was probably went
down in that area, that it's a good bed, that
it's the engines and the rest of it are too
(15:07):
far away. But I could have drifted, you know. If
there was a part of a plane that could drift,
it would be the tail. A few hours later, we're
on a boat. We're on the We're on a fifty
ft boat and Prince William Sound the Arctic Skimmer and
We are right next to Hinchinbrook Island. The cliffs are
(15:29):
rising above. It's a beautiful sunny day and we're just
about to turn into fourt edges and then there we
were the exact spot, so that rock formation just right
off there. The around nineteen man and two other men
found assessment tail, so somewhere out here they were saneing fishing.
(15:53):
As we idled, we took stock of our equipment. Unfortunately,
we did not have two very important tools side scan
sonar and a magnetometer, which would have helped a lot.
We couldn't get them in time. But we did have
two r o v s, or remotely operated vehicles, small
tethered submersibles with cameras. If you've seen Titanic, you know
(16:15):
what they look like. They're used at the beginning of
the movie to explore wreckage. One of ours belonged to Andy,
the other to the Prince William Sound Science Center, which
kindly lent it to us. Tell us about this r
OV in particular, like what its capabilities or how de trekker. Um,
(16:37):
it's a it's a high resolution camera. It's the highest
resolution camera we have. Um, we're rigging it right now.
Kind of like a controlled drop camera, so we can
thrust and tip, but we're going to drag it with
the boat just so we can cover more area than
(16:58):
we could if we were stopped swimming around with it.
We also had diving equipment and a crane just in
case we found something interesting, Say the plane the r
o V. So it's in the water. It's in the water.
(17:22):
Um are we searching that way? Starts pointing the reel.
But I didn't make a difference. I can to sure.
Let's let's just let's have it go over at this
side of the poem means the ploy said this one
(18:03):
something like that at forty dollars. So this at that
point right there, that's probably what we're looking at. And
so around there this is that this rounded part and
then that jagged rock area that is that's probably this
(18:24):
And that's where he said he found the piece to
be right over there around those rocks. Yeah, yep, right there,
right where the r o V is now. On a screen,
we watched as the r o V descended. We just
had a jellyfish some one by the camera. Seymore jellyfish
over the years, don't they proliferate when there's always been
(18:47):
a lot of gels, but maybe a few more. A
few years ago we had a really bad jellyfish season
affected sang a couple of boats. They were so so
thick about a couple of boats. They the sayners would
catch so many jellies that they'd roll over like they couldn't.
(19:09):
Their nets would pack up. They're trying to catch fish,
and the gels block the the opening of the web,
and then we just roll them right over, so the
jelly can literally take a boat down. Are you good
enough of them? So you can go down a little more? Mark,
(19:31):
I can't yet see the bottom. Okay, I can see
the bottom. Stop. Yeah, so let's we're seeing the bottom,
which is a means visibility pretty good. Hasn't hasn't rained
(19:51):
in a few days, which would money everything? Oh yeahs
I don't think there's any well as all as cricks,
but I don't think there's anything really big so unusual
this time of the year to be able to see
to the bottom, you know, the actually winner that is
(20:14):
a higher better visibility because plankton is can be your
biggest problem, and of course the cooler it is less
likely they're blooming in the summer. But plankton is can
really makes things soupy, you know. As Mark steered the
r o V aiming its camera side to side, we
(20:36):
stared at the green tinted screen, water, rocks, plants, fish.
To minimize glare, we covered the screen with a black
sheet and crawled underneath. Much better. We were just doing
it tests above water. See this is uh there? Now
I'll come back and show you this. You want to
(21:01):
that's a sea outer hole. They come down dig and
get clams and muscles and stuff. What do you need? Well,
I'm just kind of curious. Should I come back? Um,
maybe just turn off the down thruster and let's just
see where it is. Are you using the propulsion or
(21:22):
is the boat pulling it? The boats pulling it? I'm
using its propulsion to aim it. Is it pretty simple
to use or is it kind of trucky? Oh? It's
it's it's kind of like a video game. You kind
of get you know, once you figure out which fingers
doing what, you know, you get better at over time.
(21:43):
But since my excuse why fourteen year old can use
it better than I could? Is it something that we
could use for a minute or is it? Yea, I
took control of the r o V. It is zippy.
It's really surprising. You kind of sucking in to be slower,
(22:06):
so you use the propulsion and obviously to aim it.
But does does it kind of stabilize on its own
if you just let go? Should be seen in the
bottom conservac You said, where the claw? Where the claw here? Okay? Yes,
this r o V also had a remote controlled claw.
(22:29):
How would I telt to see the claw? More so
this great same thing on the other side. I'm cool,
you're looking down. H It's not super the clause and
(22:53):
super quick, but it's quick enough. I don't know, it's
not quick enough, not for fish so much. Let me
stop for a minute and meditate on how bizarre all
of this was, how surreal. Here I was off an
island in Alaska, navigating an r o V as we
(23:14):
searched underwater for a missing plane that carried to U. S. Congressmen.
To be honest, I didn't quite think the answer to
can we charter a boat and go search for the
plane would be yes, this is a podcast, But the
answer was yes, so yeah. Anyway, for hours we used
(23:34):
the r o V s to search for wreckage. A
lot of eel grass, but no plane. Later, a change
of plans, we hopped into a zodiac craft, a small
(24:21):
inflatable boat with a motor, and started zooming around, taking
advantage of the ultra clear water to conduct a visual
search looking to the floor below, because amazingly, yes, it
was clear enough to see to the bottom, at least
in shallow water. We also landed briefly on Hension Brook itself,
(24:41):
so I wonder where they're um on the map there
was some like inland water feature. I wonder where that is?
Is that an otter's So we're standing on the shore
of Henson Brook Island. We're kind of on the edge
of the trees, and the sun is going down and
we just rode up in a zodiac boat off the
(25:03):
bigger boat. And so now we're gonna wander into the
woods and hopefully not get eaten by bears or this
is gonna kind of be Blair witchy when you find
this this audio. We didn't have long on the island,
but we planned to return back in the zodiac, escape
from Pension Brook and back to the Arctic skimmer. Exhausted,
(25:39):
we anchored for the night as the sun sank in
the distance. We spotted something walking on the beach. How
how far are we from shore? A couple hundred yards,
you know, I don't maybe more from him, maybe undry
yards from him. Him was a large brown bay air.
(26:00):
Where do you go? Uh? Do you go behind a
kind of rock or something? Now, so we've all the
four of us have been tracking the bear with binoculars.
I don't think he went into the bushes. He's just behind.
So is this your first bear ever? Yeah? Well yeah,
(26:21):
sounding like in a zoovia zoos don't count. Yes, this
is this is my third. I saw one in North Carolina,
on one in Washington State and the North Cascades and
the street the third, but the first brown bear. It's
an unusually colored one. Yeah, I got something. I was
taking pictures through the binoculars. Yeah, so I was using
(26:43):
what was unusual about the color. It had a blonde
collar and then blonde ears and a lot darker brown coat.
Oh wow, here you go. Yeah that was true the binoculars. Yeah. Yeah,
so I was doing that kind up. Yeah. So, I
mean it's a much better closer picture. Wow, I've never
(27:06):
tried it. It's it's hard. You have to stay super stable.
So I have to find it with my eyes and
then hold my phone up, you know, in the perfect spot,
and then try to quickly get some pictures. But I
got video of it too. After a few minutes, the
bear cross between two rock formations and disappeared. So the
bears gone. Now for a minute, I want you to
(27:28):
close your eyes. You're on a boat, vast body of water. Twilight.
You see distant mountains backlit by a fading glow, cold wind. Calm.
You're a tiny dot in a dark wild We are
(27:52):
were anchored for the night in Poor Duchess, not far
from where we were looking for the Thesessina tail with
r o VS. And we're a few hundred feet off
the beach. We just saw a brown bear walking on
it for a while and we were all just tracking
it with binoculars. And Mark's making dinner right now, stir
fry downstairs, and we're all talking about the best way
(28:13):
to eat moose and uh oh, what do you see
something moving on the beach there? It's black? You sure
the binoculars? Wait, okay, I lost it? Now what's it
in the grass around the beach to us? So it's
like it's like it's I can't see it now putting
(28:34):
that little rocky that lighter rock color stuff. Anyway. Sorry, no,
it's all good. And uh so we're in this. We're
in Poor Duchess which is sheltered, and we're surrounded by
all these rocky hills and yeah, I mean today we
(28:55):
we went from Cordova on too Prince William Sound and
all the way to Engine Brooke and into Poor Duchess
and we used two r o vs to look for
the plane. And um, then we we hopped in the
zodiac and the water was so clear amazingly and that
we just kind of did a visual search near the shoreline. Um,
(29:19):
we didn't see anything, but we also landed on the
beach and went into into the woods. But um, it's
really serene and peaceful. There are two other boats in
Poor Duchess right now other than us, but we're kind
(29:40):
of far away from them. So we're just anchored down
for the night with the sun going down, not too
much light left, and he's I don't know what he
needs to do it maybe talking about hope for tomorrow. Um,
so tomorrow we're going to use the r o vs
and areas that we didn't search to day and we're
(30:00):
also hopefully gonna go out on the zodiac and see
if the water is still super clear, if we can
cover more ground when the light is better, when the
sun is right above us. So we did it kind
of late in the day today and we we're close
to shore. But um, but yeah, So, I mean, we
found the exact spot that was pinpointed to us where
(30:21):
the cess and the tail was pulled up, and we've
been just using the RV sook around that area. Um,
we're concentrated in a very specific spot in poort Edges.
I mean, I'm excited for dinner. It's getting colder. It
was actually really nice today. It was it was sunny
(30:42):
and it was warm at points an hour on the
front of the boat looking at the beach where the
bear was a few minutes ago. And it's freezing cold
and we're hungry. That night after dinner below deck as
we fell asleep, this is what we heard. H h
(31:02):
h h h m hm m hm hm hm m.
(31:28):
So today's day two of our search and another beautiful
day's sunny. We just had breakfast and uh Andy has
binoculars and it's piloting the boat. Mark is on the
roof of the boat. We heard his voice and we
didn't know where he was, but he's on the roof
and we're gonna take advantage of the sunlight and the
low tide and the clear water to go to the
(31:50):
area where the tail was pulled up and see if
we can see anything visually and then also used the
r o v S again um to cover ground that
we didn't cover yesterday. So for a while that's what
we did R o v S a visual search. But
other than eel, grass and fish again, nothing well, we
(32:12):
did spot something. Yeah, So we're we're right off the
coast of henteron Brook Island and we're we see some
rusted out wreckage on the beach. We're not really sure
what it is. It looks maybe like it's part of
a boat. Andy suggested we head to shore. So John
at looking at that steel debris on the beach. It's
(32:34):
and thinking of the number of storms that have happened
in the last fifty years and pushed up up. Being
that the plane was aluminum and it could have had
there's a good chance that looking at the beach line
along this point, if there was something out here, it
could have got pushed up there. We're seeing a lot
of steel things that got pushed up there. It's a
lot heavier in debtsort than aluminum. So it's it's interesting.
(32:57):
I mean, it's interesting to think. I mean, at least
part of it could have watched up onto the shore.
Maybe not the engines. Why I keep watching it, but
there's an engine. I keep watching the line with the binoculars,
and I keep you know, every Yeah, there's another piece
of metal in there, and I can see where just
(33:19):
straight in from us under the sea. It's not a
big piece. But we have we have these uh Andy
has these image stabilized expensive binoculars which are really nice
because we can see pretty far. And you know, usually
the binoculars are shaking, but you press this button and
it stabilizes it. So's it's helpful. Mark and Andy Prepp
(33:42):
the zodiac. We have a radio. We have air horn
and flares. Che tim if you can see a bear
coming towards us. We all getting in the boat. Yeah,
we climbed in and took off. Yeah. Clear when you
(34:23):
get close. So the wreckage, the metal that we saw
is further down shore. You yea, when you do anything.
We're trying to get a little bit of shelter from
this shop. You probably fine, did you guys get out? Yeah?
(34:50):
And you can just specting that guy. You got some
rocks here, you're gonna be able to pop and go
if you want to go flos if your feet your
let me go. Ye rocks the lines. So did you
get out? M I'm sure, so's Andy? You like you
(35:24):
can leave him on too. I think it's gonna lead
mine on for now. Yeah. They're worm Yeah, it's kind
of just while I'm moving it on the wipe ust.
We combed our way down the beach for a minute.
(35:44):
I disappeared into the woods. John, Yeah, where are you?
I'm on the bear drow okay, okay. As we picked
up debris, steel would bong. We looked closely for pieces
(36:07):
of aluminum. The missing plane was made mostly of aluminum ore.
Coming up on more steel again, not a not a
(36:28):
fifty five young drum. You've heard of? An old boat?
Paul and I kept showing Andy anything that seemed remotely interesting.
So you're want to just pick up this piece of
hose here off the beach which we're looking at. It's
(36:51):
got some steel reinforcing and a braided core. Doesn't look
typically marine. It definitely looks like an expensive construction, kind
of shielded like it could be possibly aircraft. We don't
see any numbers or what makes you say that it's
(37:14):
not marine. How can you just just because of the
um you have a you have a lot of room
and marine compared to aircraft. So you would be able
to instead of buying a hose that would be this
expensive to construct, you would run it away from you know,
that had to get close to heat or some reason.
(37:36):
They had that shielded hose. I think it's worth saving. Sure.
Did you see about the MH three seventy guy, the
guy who would go around and uh like the Maldives
and he went hunting for pieces of the plane and
he actually found a few. There's the article in the
Atlantic about it recently. So this is copper wire. It's
(37:57):
all rolled up like it was a part of storage.
It was amazing what Andy could tell from even the
smallest piece of debris by the type of wood or
nail or metal, or how something was constructed. He could
say this is from a boat, or this is pre
nineteen and then here's our shipwreck, and it must be
(38:22):
past two o'clock huh. I think it is because the
tide looks like it's going down. Ye Oh, it was
old seeing this boat up close. You're telling me anymore
about it? No, it's interesting because it looks like careful.
Like I said, the nails could be sticking up. So
(38:45):
we're seeing these deck planks and a little bit of
the blue right back there on different to a well.
And you can see here the blue and in the
square nails and that deck plank. I'd picked up back
there and thought this this where is this a tank?
(39:07):
Guess this is a tank? And where's the rest of
the whole? Like is this and is that fish tote
part of it? I see there's a plastic coat and
classic where nails. Would they tell you that it's older?
They do? They do, except for pretty much Johnny Wooden
(39:30):
construction is older. After combing through the wreckage for a bit,
we moved on and kept looking for clues. Yeah, we
found us another piece of illuminum. You know what, it's
stainless steel in stayle steel. I guess is it's a sink,
(39:50):
the kitchen sink. You found a sink. It's stainless I
thought it? Do you guys? See John? Yeah? Right, are
I'm pointing there's something white. I think it's a rock,
but I can't really point. Okay, it's like rounded, I think,
(40:11):
is it a rock, I'm going he's going no, it's
I think he's classic. Okay. In addition to a literal
kitchen sink, we found a checker piece, a child's flip flop,
a car bumper, dead jellyfish, the carcass of an eagle,
(40:31):
and a ton of garbage. And I mean a ton
of garbage. We've essentially turned the earth into a rotating landfill,
trash and plastic everywhere, even here on this otherwise pristine island.
The sheer amount of trash made our job hard, so
much crap to sift through, but sit through it we did.
(40:52):
You know what kind of reminds me of Phoebe Cooper,
because that one kid digging on a beach found some
of the money. And it's just like that kid happened
to be digging at the right spot at the right
time and found a clue. And so you know, we're
sitting here like coming through shift wreckage and and garbage,
(41:14):
and you know one piece could be an answer. Then
for the first time, a piece of aluminum that wasn't
a can castings, but that's definitely a casting luminum casting
rubber hose. What is that's in the shape of it.
(41:39):
It sort of looks like a bell housing it Scott.
This would have been the the finished edge probably why
it was quated. It would probably against something steel and
then it would come around and I had another machine
off the back of the engine. It would just been
like a cover or that um they flywheel would have
(42:03):
sat in. We kept it and moved one found a
small strip of metal back there O that there stainless steel.
(42:27):
It looks like it was part of a clamp. But
what would be my guess, probably from a boat probably,
I mean standless clamps are used um to hold hoses, boats, airplanes,
(42:49):
all kinds of mechanical I mean, to really find something
that we could identify as part of the plane, what
would it take, I mean other than the tail number
or serio like that cowing you know that would turned
out to be Honda. They have a uh Cessna will
have a definite um right on the front. That's a
(43:12):
Usually it's a plastic piece that's I mean that would
be like a smoking gun. UM. Any any of the
chunks of a plane aluminum like that are riveted and
have a lot of different things. So if we can
found a chunk of wing, we would know that it
was airplane related, and then we could look back and
(43:33):
see by people that really know airplanes better, what type
of airplane was this um, and then maybe get closer
to the idea of could it be the one that's
a beautiful old piece of wood? There? Searching in a
creek nearby, I found a lead patch, probably from a
boat that sank. Again, if people will say, would would
(43:56):
chunk of an airplane wash ashore made of aluminum? This
is made of lead, It washed ashore, or you found
it up the creek from the high tide, so um,
Definitely things get pushed up. I think this was a
good idea. I mean, you know, given the situation, we
probably have a better chance of finding I think the
(44:18):
playing on the shore. I think so. And we're able
to search so thoroughly, you know, looking at the rocks
where the eel grass that was one thing. The the
r o vs quickly became tangled in the ear eel
glass gel grass. The the thrusters um and see it's
good we have you alonggo because you can identify off this.
(44:40):
I won't really, you know, barring something blatantly obvious like
a waning in one. Yeah, I still put these on
um places where we you know, we look at Okay,
that doesn't necessarily need to be repaired, but we'd like
to protect it. So far, so far, coming to beach,
we've only found one piece of non can aluminum. Yea,
that pizza that we found back there, right that, Yeah,
(45:02):
that was a cast piece of a Liminum too. We're
fairly starting that would not be from an airplane. Um,
the the engine parts could be cast. There could be
parts that are bolted to the engine that are cast. Um,
it wasn't it wasn't necessarily a shape that would preclude
(45:22):
it from being from an airplane. Might as well take
it back with us. We can take it back somebody
that might that's an expert. No more about. But um,
we're used in a lot of marine engines as well.
Aluminum cast like that. So the the plane. If the
(45:42):
plane is sitting somewhere under the water here, or if
it's broken into pieces, you think it's still be whatever's
left of it was still being pretty good shape. Liminium
doest pretty well in this climate underwater. Um, so it
could be covered with marine growth. But yeah, I think
(46:07):
it it could be. H what's it been over fifty years? Yeah,
it could be. I mean, especially if it's for whatever
reason it's entombed in mud. I mean, it might be
preserved pretty well. We're able to find it. I just
(46:28):
kept having this image with the R O V yesterday
of the tail and seeing that, seeing the number pop up.
But and we don't know if it We're not sure
if the tail was pulled up and delivered to the
tender to take the court over, or just the numbers
were transferred. Right. That was a little bit of a
Bob could really remember that. And I wonder, Um, I
mean the number might have been in more than one place.
(46:49):
I mean that the main you know, would have been
in one prominent place. But we probably battling right now, boy,
(47:26):
losing daylight. We doubled back, so we're about to get
on the part of the beach directly opposite from where
Bob found the tail. M h m hm. Sure, looking
(48:10):
for like a message carbon the cliff Bogs is here.
As the tide rose, we reached the massive rock formation
jutting into the water blocking us uh but yeah, is
there a way around that side? Uh? Well, I could
(48:34):
hop up on here, but I just don't know how
steepid is on the other side. It's manage the ball.
You might want to go down to Paul, Say, what
where are you at? I'm on the other side now
I'm behind you. Oh okay, yeah you, I mean you
you can go too that. You have to get on
your knees and crawls. Do you want me to grab
(48:55):
Anya you might want? Yeah? Can you just hold that?
So Paul is crawling almost on his stomach under a
(49:17):
big rock formation and he's through. You know, I know
it's unlikely, but when you do something like that, I
just can't help but imagine this thing collapsing. Well, I
was waiting until I was waiting until you got out.
So now how do we go? It looks like you
(49:38):
did get shimmy down the side. Okay, and like that,
our time on the island ran out. Your Mark, you're
still on there? Uh in the galley is waiting? Well?
You in my world famous spaghetti dinner. All right, Well
(50:00):
we walked up an appetite, were turned around, and we're
headed your way. So we'll see in a little bit.
Mark picked us up in the zodiac. You like the
assorted oh stuff that I'm bringing back. We found a
lot of stuff, but this is the stuff we weren't
quite sure about. Oh wow, wow, man, it's so pretty
(50:28):
getting water over the side. Change my socks when I
got back or suck only got one water walk flood. Yeah,
we found a lot from that one shipwreck whatever. It
was pretty cool. Old boat. I don't know, wouldn't beams
(50:52):
and planks, kind of square nails, definitely a little construction. Yeah,
scare nails anymore. Climbing up a ladder onto the Arctic skimmer,
I set down the debris I kept, including the piece
of cast aluminum, and I changed my sock for dinner
(51:15):
mark spaghetti. Then it was time to leave. Andy navigated
us out of Poor Duchess, but before he got too
far I asked him to stop for a minute. So
we're just off the coast of Pension Brook, but specifically
New Check and there's a really narrow strip of land
and we've talked to some pilots who say that this
(51:37):
is a good place to land a plane and they
use it actually now to land plane small planes. Um,
it's like a very long narrow strip of lands rocky
um sandy um, you know, and it's surrounded, it's rained
by the east. These mountains these really tall maybe get
more than like a thousand feet hide really high. Um.
(52:00):
But so if we run on the hypothesis that the
tailpiece that was found in Port Duchess belongs to the
plane we're looking for, trying to figure out, well, you
have this perfect landing strip, why would you have gone
around the corner into and ended up in Port Chess.
I mean maybe a few explanations. The plane could have
(52:21):
gone down around here and the tailpiece got dragged around
the corner. Um. Maybe the visibility was really bad and
don was the pilot was trying to turn around to
come back and land in this spot. UM. I mean,
there are different explanations. But it's really weird to see
this in person. I've seen this on Google Maps so
many times that you know, to be here with these
(52:44):
thousand foot tall mountains and this rugged, beautiful water. Um.
But yeah, so we're about to head back to Cordova
and we're leaving Pinsinbrook behind, and if we come back
here with more equipment, we would love to search this
area off this um long landing strip. How do I feel?
(53:05):
How do I feel? I mean, honestly, I feel good.
I feel. Why am I asking myself how I feel? I? Uh,
I feel like this trip was worth it because I
got a really good understanding of the geography of the area,
um of this strip of land that I've seen on
a map but I've never seen in person, of how
(53:27):
tall the mountains are, of what port edges looks like.
And when we went to the spot that um Bob
told us he found the cess in the tail, we
got a much better idea of where he would have
set his nets and where he could theoretically have pulled
up the tailpiece, and you can kind of narrow it
down to this very specific area. And uh Andy and
(53:48):
Mark helped us with that. So if we were to
come back here with a magnetometer with side scanning sonar,
we have some really good specific points in areas that
we could search. And then for several hours as we
zip back a break, no searching, no interviews, just time
to think and try not to puke, because the return trip,
(54:11):
for me at least, was rough. I don't usually get
sick on boats, but for whatever reason that day I
did nausea aside. I stepped out of the cabin onto
the deck multiple times, wearing a life vest, gripping rails,
watching islands and mountains vanished behind us, bathed by a
striking sunset, fiery reds and oranges giving away to cool
(54:33):
blues and paints. As darkness fell, we pulled into Cordova.
(54:57):
Now there's something I need to tell you, something I
haven't told you. The day before, while we were on
the water, out of cell range, or so we thought,
Andy's phone buzzed once. It was a text with bad news.
That day at exactly one pm, about ninety minutes after
(55:18):
we got to Poor Dutch's, an Army National Guard unit
in the mountains near Cordova found the body of Neil Durko,
the thirty three year old hunter who disappeared right before
we got to town. Durko fell down a steep shoot
and died. Because such as Alaska, a place where so
many fine meaning and others die young, where sometimes amateurs
(55:40):
survive and experts don't, where hunters are found and congressmen aren't.
(56:00):
Next time on missing in Alaska this week for your
(56:30):
task something fun. Google Alaska shore Zone. Shore Zone is
a free interactive mapping system that, among other things, allows
you to explore seventy thousand miles of shoreline in Alaska.
Click on a spot and you can see photos, videos, etcetera.
Go zoom around, visit tension Brooke, who knows maybe you'll
(56:51):
spot something interesting. You can reach us by phone at
one eight three three M I A tips that's one
eight three three say four to eight four seven seven
again one eight three three six four to eight four
seven seven, or you can reach us via email at
(57:12):
tips at iHeart media dot com. That's tips, T I
P S at iHeart media dot com. Ben Bollen is
our executive producer. Paul Decan is our supervising producer, Chris
Brown is our assistant producer, Seth Nicholas Johnson is our producer.
Sam T. Garden is our research assistant. And I'm your
(57:32):
host and executive producer, John Wallsack. You can find me
on Twitter at at John wallzac j O n W
A l c z A K. Special thanks to our
captains Andy and Mark, and to Bob Martinson. A big
thank you also to the Prince William Sound Science Center
and specifically Scott Pega. Their website is p w S
(57:55):
sc dot org. If you can go donate there are
a great nonprofit. Finally, when this wretched pandemic passes, please
visit Cordova. You won't regret it. Trust me for now, though,
support the fisherman. If you can afford it, try some
Copper River salmon. People say it's the best salmon in
the world. Missing in Alaska is a co production of
(58:18):
I Heart Media and Greenford Media.
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