Halifax 57 Rescue (Canada) and the Bomber Command Museum of Canada, in partnership with the Swedish Coast and Sea Center (SCSC), started last week the underwater recovery of a Second World War Royal Canadian Air Force Halifax bomber off the coast of Sweden.

The first operations for the recovery took place from July 1-7 south of Falsterbo, Sweden, with recovery crews and vessels based at the Port of Trelleborg, Sweden.

“Weather now is the big variable and we are determined to get out there to dig out our Halifax,” wrote Halifax57 Rescue Canada project manager Karl Kjarsgaard in a July 2 blog post.

The Handley Page Halifax heavy bomber HR871 was assigned in 1943 to the elite Canadian RCAF 405 “Pathfinder” Squadron, whose job was marking the Nazi targets in Germany for the main force bombers of RAF Bomber Command.

Halifax HR871 was badly damaged, losing two engines and having only marginal flight controls, on the Hamburg, Germany, raid of Aug. 3, 1943. With little hope of returning to England the crew, led by pilot Flt. Sgt. John Phillips, diverted to neutral Sweden. All the crew of seven bailed out successfully just inland along the south coast of Sweden. (John Alwyn Phillips, the pilot, lives in the UK and is keen on the recovery, reads a June 24 news release posted on the Halfax recovery project’s Fundrazr page.

The bomber continued flying until it crashed into the Baltic Sea 15 kilometres off the Swedish coast and sank into 20 metres of brackish (slightly salty) water. Since that time it has been inundated and covered by sand although three engines and small portions of the aircraft are visible, which indicates her final resting place.

Diving teams and a sonar vessel have already done intensive reconnaissance of the Halifax HR871 site in 2017 and 2018, reads the news release.

The Halifax bomber was one of the top two bombers used by RAF Bomber Command in the Second World War.

During the war, the RCAF had 15 bomber squadrons in action in Bomber Command. For the last five months of the war the RCAF was using mainly the Lancaster bomber, but from 1941-1944, the RCAF used the Halifax bomber. Seventy percent of all bomber combat done by the Canadian RCAF was on the Halifax.

The goal of the recovery project is to have a Halifax bomber on display at the Bomber Command Museum of Canada, alongside the museum’s Lancaster bomber.

The goal of the Halifax project is to have a Halifax bomber on display at the Bomber Command Museum of Canada, alongside the museum’s Lancaster bomber.

Anyone who wants to donate to the Halifax recovery project can do so through the website https://fundrazr.com/417498.