Persistence pays: Johnson
family finds original Sikorsky S-38
By Barbara A. Schmitz
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Tom Kalina with
the Sikorsky Carnauba aircraft.
Photo by Phil Weston |
When you at first don’t
succeed, try, try again. For the S.C. Johnson family, that mantra paid
off.
Earlier this month, the
Johnson family—brothers Fisk and Curt, sister Helen Johnson-Leipold
and their mother, Imogene—found the wreckage of the original Carnauba
Sikorsky S-38 airplane in 90-feet of water in Manokwari Bay, New Guinea.
H.F. Johnson used it in
the 1930s to search for carnauba wax trees in Brazil. But they sold it,
and at the time of the crash three years later, it was being used by
another firm to explore for oil.
"It was right
underneath our noses," said Tom Kalina who went with the family on
the excursion. "I don’t know why we didn’t find it the first
time. Maybe the sonar operator didn’t have it positioned right or
maybe he happened to turn his hand at the moment we went by."
But within one day of
their July excursion, they located it, Kalina said. "This time they
used a different type of sonar, but we also had more information."
That information came
from a recreational diver who just happened to find the plane about one
year ago. "He had done a lot of different dives and he couldn’t
remember exactly where it was. But he gave us enough information to tell
us to go back where we had been."
The question now is can
the plane be retrieved? "We’ve hired people from Texas A&M to
evaluate if it is salvageable and what that would mean as far as time,
money and logistics," Kalina said. Their report should be completed
within two months and then a decision will be made.
They took one piece of
the wreckage, but Kalina says they aren’t sure what it is. In its
place they left a plaque that reads: I am Carnauba, my true home is not
this bay but the hearts of all who love adventure."
The search for the S-38
originated in 1997, and included research, even finding the pilot who
crashed the plane.
A replica Carnauba S-38,
which took 3-1/2 years to build, is on display at AeroShell Square
during EAA AirVenture Oshkosh. In 1998, the late Sam Johnson and his
sons, Curt and Fisk, recreated the Brazil trip in the replica.
The company plans to construct a building
on its Racine campus where it will display the replica from the ceiling,
Kalina said.
