23/09/2013 Inside Out South West

Welcome to the programme. Stories and investigations from where you

live. Tonight, tragedy in the sound. One diver 's quest to solve

the mystery of a wartime plane crash. He had a premonition of the

night before that something would happen. He picked his life jacket on

and made his friend put one on as well. Also, this artist is on a

mission to help save the humble moth. They are creatures of the

night and they are strange beasts that prefer the night to the day.

Sea birds in peril. If you did that to cats and dogs, they would be an

uproar. How science is on the trail of those responsible for a

devastating chemical spill. Three years ago, a local diver made

an extraordinary discovery here. Tonight we have exclusive access to

underwater footage and we tell the story of one man 's obsession to

uncover the true story behind a wartime tragedy. It became apparent

that there was a whole lot more down there. This was not at random

wreckage, it was a whole aircraft. It had not been documented. But

further dives revealed a remarkable story. Underneath one of the

engines, I saw a small piece of crockery. I picked it up and it was

the emblem for the RAF on a plate and I counted the amount of pistons

it had. Subsequent research turned out it was a Pegasus engine fitted

to a Sunderland aircraft. How it never dawned on me before, I will

never know! In 1939 Plymouth's RAF Mountbatten was home to the

Sunderland Flying Boat, largely crewed by members of the Australian

Air Force. Little remains of the base apart from a plaque

commemorating the heroism of the Aussie flyers. The listed hangars

remain, home to luxury yacht businesses Danny is keen to find out

more about the planes and the men that flew them. He's gone to London

to see one of the few Sunderlands that has survived. Is Sunderland was

a stalwart of the coastal command. Very heavily armed, known to the

Germans as the flying porcupine. Throughout the war years, she was

absolutely vital but for convoy escort and for intercepting U—boats.

Danny's trip is throwing up vital information in his search to find

out what happened to the plane. It has enabled me to identify a lot of

the pieces. To have tangible contact with it is brilliant. I have very

little on the scene they had left. Danny's got hold of an official

RAFreport that confirms that a Sunderland did crash beyond Plymouth

Breakwater. It cites pilot error. He meets Darrel Jago, an expert on

Plymouth's flying boats. Darrel's researched the last flight of the

Sunderland, which took off in the early hours of December 21 1941.

Darrel has a theory on what happened. They were going from the

end of Mountbatten peer to take off—line. The Sunderland was on its

way to Gibraltar. It just managed to get off but they did not get enough

height to give the breakwater and they slammed into that. Only four

airmen survived. The Australian pilot was among the dead and lies

buried far from home in a Plymouth cemetery. Four bodies remain

unaccounted for. The crash remains are now a protected war grave.

Darrell thinks the weather may have played a part in the men's deaths.

Ticking off is not easy and with this particular one, it had a full

load of fuel to get to Gibraltar, extra crew, so it was pretty heavy

laden. Things were against them. It would be interesting to know what

the weather was like at the time because if it was calm, they have a

job to unstick. They need some ways to break free from the suction. To

find out if the weather might have been a factor, Danny visits

Catherine Ross at the Met Office archives in Exeter. Could calm seas

have helped stick the plane to the water? Here we have the station

symbol for Plymouth. As you can see, there was a large high pressure

over the country, particularly the south. Very stable weather

conditions. We also had this to show you, which is the climate returned

from Plymouth Mountbatten. As close as we can get to the crash. It shows

calm wind conditions again. Moderate cloud cover and visibility so a good

night. But not a good night for taking off in a Sunderland. So

Darrel was right about the weather. But did the plane crash into the

breakwater? Danny gets a letter from the RAF which seems to undermine

that idea. It was later reported that beyond breakwater for, the

pilot put the nose down to gain speed and flew into the sea. This

leaves Danny with two completely conflicting accounts of why the

Sunderland crashed. The first theory is, the aircraft came along the

runway here, took off and managed to get airborne but did not get high

enough to clear the breakwater here. The tail section except the

breakwater, the pilot lost control and found himself crashed into the

sea close by here. The other theory is that the pilot managed to get

enough height, cleared the breakwater but did not have enough

speed to maintain flight. So he put the aircraft into a shallow dive to

increase his air velocity but miscalculated the height of the

aircraft was out and the result was, he dived headfirst into the sea.

Danny is beginning to believe that the plane didn't hit the breakwater.

To help solve the mystery, he's off to Doncaster. He's made contact with

the daughter of one of the crash survivors. Harry Lodge lived on into

his 70s. Did he reveal to relatives what happened back in 1941? For the

first time, the family see footage of the flying boat wreckage and then

give Danny a dramatic account of Harry's lucky escape. He had a

premonition the night before that something was going to happen. He

put his life jacket on and he made his friend put it on as well. He

remembers seeing the pilot" to see if they had cleared the breakwater

and the next thing he knew, he was in the sea. All his teeth had been

knocked out and his skull had been fractured. The plane's fuel tanks

exploded on impact. It was a lucky premonition — Harry's friend with

the life jacket also survived. Harry's son—in—law has more clues

from an interview the airman gave to a local paper. I discovered after

worried that the pilot had stalled as he tried to clear the breakwater

in Plymouth harbour. 11 of the crew died including him. He had his head

out the window trying to see the breakwater as it crashed. So, it

stalled? Yes. So was it a simple stall or clipping the breakwater

that that led to the deaths of eleven men? We may never know and to

protect the war grave even now the RAF prefers to leave certain details

of the crash site unpublished. But ex—Navy man Danny understands the

huge strain on a pilot in wartime and prefers to believe the crash was

due to an unavoidable stall and not human error. Have I cleared the

breakwater, and I airborne? Before we have any other time to react, the

plane has stalled and gone in. Beyond his ability or keep ability

to do anything about it. For Danny his search for the truth may be

over. Now he wants to work with the RAF to survey the site properly.

Danny knows that's he's not just handling rusty pieces of a ruined

plane — but bits of a machine that once held the souls of 15 brave men.

The stunning beauty of the South West has inspired many creative

people but the latest project of the leading artist Kirk Jackson features

nothing more than a humble and often overlooked insect, one that is

struggling for survival. I have been painting the wildlife around my home

for 20 years but recently, I have turned my attention back to a

creature I was fascinated with as a kid and that is the humble moth.

I want people to think about them with fresh ideas and appreciate

them. One person very much aware of them and their current plight is a

farmer friend of mine who shares my fascination with these little

creatures. All right? Nice to see you. Bernard is mad about Marcus and

has been trapping them for 15 years. That is a nice one. Small mag five.

The best one I have seen this year. Brimstone? That is right. Not the

Brimstone butterfly, they get confused. That is emerald but all of

those scales have worn off. Bernard Orton has three home—made traps at

once. But he has to be careful where he places them. The birds get to

know if you put them in the same place. They will pick up all of the

ones on the outside. They can get into the trap, if they can. For my

benefit, Bernard has kept some specimens from the night before. You

have some special ones. Fantastic. Isn't that spectacular? Hawk moth.

This is a beauty. It just looks like a hazel twig that has been snapped

off on one end and that is the dead piece. One of my favourites.

Absolutely beautiful, but have not seen one of those for years and

years. Beautiful. Elephant more. You would think that was a tropical

insect, wouldn't you? Look at that. They can hide all day and nobody

will see them. Look at its tummy. Pink and green. Beautiful as well.

We did not do too badly. Some real beauties. Any ideas how many species

we have recorded here? Bowl, over 300, anyhow. Over these 15 years,

have you noticed any changes? Their numbers have definitely dropped. We

used to open the traps back in the summer when it was good, six or

seven years ago, and there would be clouds of moths and you are not

searching for moths. My interest in natural history goes right back to

when I was a kid and moths is just one element, but there was always a

new species to find. Getting the little book out, identification

book, finding out what it was and where it came from. Exciting stuff.

Recorders like Bernard have shown there has been a 40% decline in

numbers since I was a kid. Which is really scary, it is really important

not just for the moths but also, they are at the bottom of a food

chain and so many other animals are living of them. You think just bird

species, their food is largely made up from insects and moths. To help

try to understand the reasons for this decline, I have come to the

Royal Cornwall Museum to meet moth expert, Adrian Spalding. The museum

holds a wonderful collection of old moths that provides a snapshot of

the population over 100 years ago. We have this fantastic garden tiger,

we know that is going because of climate change. This one, I have

chosen, one of my favourites. Orange apple wing. That is extinct. In the

prime causes is what experts call fragmentation. Colonies need to

interchange so they can breed and if they become isolated, but is the

road to extinction and you have habitat fragmentation because of

intensive agriculture and the road network and lights and so on.

Because of urbanisation, more houses. And hedges from the network

across the countryside and moths will use them to fly from one area

to another but they will not go across open fields. They will follow

hedges. Like a moth corridor. Yes. Adrian has been leading a research

into exactly how streetlights have contributed to fragmentation. He

uses specially erected lights at Bournemouth University. Moths come

to the light and we had a lot of streetlights and we are getting more

of them a programme to change the old sodium lights which we used to

see everywhere into white lights and here we have two orange lights and

two of them are white. We can see the moths coming to the orange light

and the white light. The research shows that the older orange lights

were far less attractive to moths than these white ones. They will

potentially be worse because they are taking moths away from their

natural habitat and interfering with natural behaviour. Fortunately, as I

see it, I live in a part of the country with few streetlights. I am

hoping for a good catch in my garden with this special trick. This

sheet, it is above and behind the trap and that will increase the

likeness of the light. Before traps, all they had where Kelly lumps and

sheets and that is what they use today. I am playing on that old

idea. With any luck, I will capture some of those amazing hawk moths

that I saw at Bernard 's house yesterday. Plenty of moths tonight.

They are zooming past me, in the undergrowth and all—around. We can

get a good view of them and hopefully I can do some drawings as

well. They are creatures of the night, that is one of the reasons

that I love them. Strange beasts that a night to day. Perfect. Carpet

moth. That is the elephant hawk moth. Beautiful. The following

morning, I'm getting more sketches before returning the moths back to

the hedgerow. Some of these will be worked up for an exhibition whilst

others will remain as a record of the night. I think, like most people

in my work, I want people to enjoy my work and get excited but also for

the work to have more residents. There is so many of them and people

are not aware of them. I hope that people who see these pictures will

spare a thought for the plight of the humble moth. My concern is that

with the continual development of rural areas, that 40% decline could

get worse. Eight months ago, thousands of dead and dying sea

birds started washing up on our shores covered in a mysterious

sticky substance that stopped birds feeding and flying. The official

investigation drew a blank but, as we've been finding out, that's by no

means the end of the story. It was from this stretch of Cornish coast

that naturalist and wildlife cameraman Ian McCarthy saw what was

happening to the sea birds he loves. It was like someone had taken those

living creatures and dip them in varnish. It was very hard to watch

them die. I only go one mile offshore and I was finding birds out

there dead and dying. And probably quite if you never hit the shore.

This was just the tip of the iceberg, even though it was horrible

on this beach, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. Hundreds of

affected birds had first been seen in late January but April saw

thousands wash up along 130 miles of the South West coast. Alison Fogg

helped pick up scores of birds from Lansallos beach near Polperro. It

was difficult counting them so I started writing numbers in the sand.

I got to an hundred and 57 and that's where I got to 157 and I

realised there must be 400 on the next beach. We were talking about

thousands of birds, destroyed. The oil stick, widely thought to have

come from a tanker washing out its cargo, was of an industrial

lubricant called PIB. It is legal to wash out in small amounts but the

authorities suspected a large illegal discharge. Legal or not,

wildlife charities say the practice has to stop. We are so used to

thinking we can put things into the sea and they will disappear. But

they will not. It has an impact in the food chain and it kills birds.

We must stop treating the sea as it dustbins. —— as a dustbin. The job

of pinpointing the one ship among the thousands that use the English

Channel every week fell to this man, Captain Jeremy Smart, chief

investigator for the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. These are not

just boats picking up from British and northern European ports? They go

all around the world? This is a shipping lane? It is like the M25?

Captain Smart focused his investigation on empty chemical

tankers passing south of Land's End from April six to the ninth, which

is when injured but still living birds began to appear on our

beaches. April six — April nine. We went to the safety agency. We said,

given this blog that we have identified, can you give us details

of the tracks of the chemical tankers passed through in that given

time frame. This gave him 59 tankers, which were quickly whittled

down to the 16 most likely. That was just the beginning of the search. As

the MCA continued the hunt for the ship, completely independently, this

Plymouth University Professor decided to use science to track the

exact type of PIB that had killed the birds. This is one of the birds

supplied by the RSPCA. And that is what PIB does to feathers. Professor

Steve Rowland was the first person to identify the stuff as PIB from a

sample sent to him by BBC South West. Each type of PIB is a distinct

and commercially confidential mix, used in products as varied as

chewing gum and explosives. Steve's trying to crack the chemical code in

as many industrial samples as he can get to find a match for the one that

killed the birds. The material on the birds and on the beaches seems

to be this really sticky material. It is the stickiness that has caused

the problems. It glues feathers together. After several months of

detective work in the lab, Steve has already tested nine samples and

narrowed it down to an unusual type of PIB. We have these peaks. And on

the birds, that is three. So he's close but not there yet. Giving

enough cooperation and samples, could you identify where this

product came from? I think so. If we were able to get the one product or

couple of products that match, that would limit the number of

possibilities. This is the worst PIB pollution incident known in European

waters but it's not the first. In 1994, a tanker legally washed its

tanks of lubricating oil additive out off Liverpool. A glue—like

substance washed up along 100 miles of coast. Hundreds of birds died.

The tanker was identified because it was seen washing its tanks.

Unfortunately this time the MCA has no eye witnesses, and no tell tale

tide of pollution. Unlike a crude oil slick, which is easily seen, PIB

is colourless and floats just under the sea surface. Every pollution

case that we have taken, there has been witness or satellite evidence

or direct correlation through samples and what have you. We have

not got any of that on this occasion. We tried but it is not

there. There must have been a ship? There must have been something. The

only other possibility is that the incident happened before the sixth?

Yes. Once you start to expand your time frame, your geographical area

expands because it drifts and at some point you must say,

realistically, are we going to get anything? What a beautiful day.

Although the mystery ship has disappeared along with any prospect

of prosecution, the paper has not. This is a good spot. At Lansallos

beach in July, Alison and Ian discover it's still here. That is

still coated in PIB. That is a bit of bird. If you did that to cats and

dogs, just let them die, there would be an uproar. It is just that people

don't see that out there. That is what is happening, it is a horrible

way to die. There is the bigger question, stop that happening. It is

just plain wrong. Stock to the rocks. All around. This is the high

water mark. There's hope, though, that science might yet provide the

answer. Another important clue has come from a German chemist. Inside

Out has spoken to an independent expert who analysed for the MCA the

PIB that killed all these sea birds. He's concluded that it is an

unusual variant of the chemical, which isn't commonly carried. And

that's significant because it could pave the way for a change in the

law. If the International Maritime Organisation finds that this

particular PIB is a new type that hasn't been assessed, it could ban

its disposal at sea. If there is any flaw in the lower, which has enabled

a product like this to be legally discharged but still can be

significant harm to the environment and wildlife, yes, of course the law

needs to be changed. Tracing the maker of this rare PIB involved

could help find the ship and the MCA says if important new information

comes to light, the investigation could be re—opened. The mystery of

where this deadly slick of chemicals came from may yet be solved. That is

all for this week. We are back next Monday with more stories. Goodbye.