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Fun with Google Earth

This months issue of Air Classics Magazine has a great article about a family in 1960 who decided to fly around the world in a World War II era PBY Catalina Flying Boat. Unfortunately, the flight came to an end in Saudi Arabia, when the family was attacked by ( as the article states) "Blood-crazed Muslims".

It's a great story, but I kept thinking "Now where have I heard of this story before?"

And then I remembered. It was on Google Earth.

I occasionally spend hours using Google Earth and looking for interesting things that can be found on the pages of that system. Its a great way to waste time. Chilean Navy bases( with submarines!), cattle fences that cross northern Nevada, oil refineries and tank farms deep in Libyan desert, missile bases outside of Damascus, political advertisements cut into the desert sands of South America, they are all fun to look at. I was once looking up and down the coast of the Gulf of Aqaba to see what can be seen from space and sure enough, I found this:

Yes, its the very same PBY flying boat thats covered in the article. The PBY, Shot down in 1960 with an American family and a reporter on board. They surivived the attack by hostile locals, and later, met members of the Saudi Royal Family and yet here we were 47 years later looking at a picture of the same aircraft as it sits on a beach of the gulf.

You can't hide anything from anyone these days. You can't even hide things that happened 47 years ago.

Posted @ April 10, 2007 10:51 PM | Current Affairs

Posted by: Greybeard at April 13, 2007 06:43 PM