HOME > BUFFALO > BW-372 > 6 - PENSACOLA

BW-372 uncrated at Pensacola
Doug Kirby inspects the aft fuselage of BW-372 as it was uncrated at the Pensacola Naval Aviation museum on August 18, 2004. Note the hakaristi (bent-leg cross) emblem of the Finnish Air Force, very similar to the swastika associated with Nazi Germany. The plan is to display the aircraft in its Finnish Air Force warpaint with minimal restoration.

Let us be happy for BW-372!
the Brewster Buffalo has found a home :)

In the winter of 2001-02, this promising note appeared on the Commerce Business Daily website: "The Naval Inventory Control Point (NAVICP) Philadelphia is proposing to acquire a Brewster Buffalo (F2A-1) on behalf of the National Museum of Naval Aviation (NMNA) through the Navy's museum exchange program. In exchange, the NAVICP will trade three (3) stricken P3 aircraft currently located at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Az. The exchange will proceed on or after 06 Dec 2001."

After was the operative word! The Brewster fighter finally reached the Naval Aviation museum in Pensacola in August 2004. The fuselage arrived in two crates, the engine (with the propeller wrapped around it) in a third crate, the wings in a fourth, and other bits and pieces in a fifth. The crates were sent to the museum's restoration hangar, where the two halves of the fuselage were set on jigs, and the wings put in place:

Starboard view of BW-372

Starboard view of the Brewster fighter. The Finnish fuselage number and hakaristi are clearly visible. Photo by Bill Dunbar.

Port view of BW-372 Port view of BW-372. Note the plump tire, manufactured by Nokia and still inflated when the plane came out of the water! The hindquarters of a lynx (the squadron emblem) are visible just above the wing.

The museum plans to reassemble the Brewster and display it as it came from the lake in Russia. "Damage caused by enemy fire and subsequent crash landing will not be disturbed," says the museum's director. "Only damage done during recovery, storage and movement operations will be repaired.... As near as possible, it will be fully authentic and original and instantly recognizable as a Finnish Air Force Model 239 Buffalo at a point in time when it made its last flight in hostile skies and settled to the bottom of the lake."

Bullet entry wound
A close-up of BW-372's port wing shows the entry wound from a machine-gune bullet or cannon shell that tore into the leading edge and exited out the trailing edge.

Victory marks on the tail
The victory marks on the tail: this photo seems to show at least seven, and I'm told that a biplane is also visible. Part of the squadron's "Farting Elk" mascot is also recognizable on the nose of the Brewster.

Good news, indeed, after more than half a century at the bottom of a lake, not to mention six years of wandering in the wilderness from Karelia to Moscow to Dublin to Mobile, Alabama! Read the following files for BW-372's checkered history before and after it crash-landed in that Russian lake.

Next: 7 - "It's so wrong, what has happened" (Marja Lampi's story)

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