Some ABMM Bunker Hunter Photos

[abmm]

As promised, here are some more photos. More to follow as I dig through our archives...


As you can see this one we didn't need to dig up. It came from the Z Special Unit WWII Demolition range. It's armour plate with shaped charge holes in it circa 1943.


From the Z Special Unit supply dump. An extremely rare Pocket Incendiary (fire bomb) device. The brown thing is the leather container for the incendiary mixture. the green thing is the firing device. It is now totally safe with no explosive or incendiary conent at all due to the leather case deteriorating and 65 years of wind and rain leached all of the nasty stuff out. Interestingly, the device wasn't a dud. They had buried one in perfect working order. These were also used by the British SOE and US OSS clandestine warfare units. We found it with an antique vietnam era mine detector at a depth of around 6 inches.



This one WAS live so we left it well alone and notified Explosive Ordnance Disposal. It's hard to see, but it is a WWII PIAT (Projector, Infantry Anti-Tank) round, a kind of early anti tank rocket. For a diagram of a PIAT round see http://web.ukonline.co.uk/stephen.johnson/arms/piat.jpg.


This phot is quite interesting. It shows a live Japanese 7.7mm rifle round with some .303 british cartridge cases. If you look carefully, you'll see a couple of bits of rusted steel and some white rocks. The rusted steel is another PIAT round and the white rocks are actually TNT explosive (long since deactivated by weathering). This stuff is sitting just where it fell in 1943 or 1944. So why were ther Japanese rounds at a WWII Aussie Special Forces base? They trained extensively with enemy weapons. We have found strip magazines for a Jap 7.7mm "woodpecker" machine gun as well as a curved magazine for a nambu 6.5 mm machine gun. This stuff is all just lying on the ground. As far as I know, we are the only ones who've been there since around 1950 due to the remote location and its secret nature.


9mm, .32 and .38 pistol shells lying where they fell in 1943. You don't even really need a metal detector for this particular spot - it's all just lying around.

Another site...


Yours truly entering a USAAF bunker. This site is usually under water. Australia's recent drought provided a perfect opportunity to enter the bunker and see if the urban legends about tunnels inside were correct.


Inside the main chamber in the bunker. No tunnels and no Harley Davidson WLA motorcycles in their crates unfortunately, but at least we cleared that mystery up.


A shot of the outside of the bunker. The water level is usually most the way up the front wall. This lake is actually a disused railway quarry established the early 1900s for quarrying ballast. During and after WWII it was used as a dump by your military and mine...

Check it out

The photos below are not mine. They were taken in 1992 by a group of guys who drained the quarry, chasing jeeps and mustang fighters. What they got was just as interesting. You can read the full story here: The Archerfield Quarry - full of World War 2 equipment.

I thought I'd include these photos as an example of what is sitting under water or under the ground all around Australia. This is what we spend our time on. It's not only Aussie history, but yours too.

Cheers

[Sly]

Amazing! some of the 50's look like they were still ready to roll!

[Joker]

Good stuff!

[pris]

Oh my gosh! This has to be some of the most interesting material I've seen in a while. Soooo neat. Thanks so much for gracing us all with your presence. Please sir, may I have some more????!!!!

[EBCIII]

Now that is some cool stuff! Some serious weapons, be careful, Beale.

[Buster]

Really cool stuff for sure...History is one of my favorite things...Along with Spam...Thanks for the great photos and will await the next set for sure....Buster....

[Geode]

That is some very interesting finds u have there mate, i like the history side of things there sure is a lot of it here in Australia, and here in the North.


George

[homefire]

Lotts of keen toys!