These pix were mailed to me, and are claimed to be of a German tank being recovered recently from a marsh in Europe. I don't know if they're authentic, but if so, it's remarkable how little corrosion there is after so many years in the water.

That's a beutepanzer T-34. And in very good condition.

Marshes are known for their extremely good preservation qualities.

WOW!
An amazing set of pics!
Do you know their source or if their is an article with them? It appears to be a T-34 with German Markings, a rare find I imagine.
Id say they are genuine, as it would take a lot of work to bury a tank for the sake of a few pics. As for the lack of corosion, once buried in the bog the tank would have been in an anoxic (oxygen free) environment and so corrosion would have been kept to a minimum. 5000+ year old skeletons and artefacts have been found in excellent preservation in bogs in Britain and Ireland over the years, to which 65 years is a mere blink of an eye. Although this poses the question as to wether the crew are still inside!

James

I cant remember where I saw it, but there is also video of this same recovery. Shows the tank being pulled out by a large tractor of some sort.

Photos taken in Estonia back in 2000. By a strange coincidence the markings under the balkenkreuz show it originally belonged to an Estonian unit in the Red Army.

T-34

David

Mark you seen it here Recovered 'German' Russian tank and here is the the site with the video Russian Tank

Joe

Thank you sir.

Great photos and article.
thanks
DJ

unbelievable, even the paint seems to be intact

The mud must have added a protective layer to it. Shocked how well it looks. Even the Cross on the front is visible!

Thanks for posting the links guys, what an amazing story! Unbeleivable that such a find was discovered on the memory of one guy! and the condition is incredible, I can't beleive they got the engine started without replacing anything! This goes a long way to show what a sturdy tank the T-34 was! You can just make out the russian markings on the turret in a couple of the pics.

Truly an amazing find, Thankyou so much for sharing guys!

James

Hi All, I've seen the video related to this and it's quite exceptional.
It could be (I'm speculating here) this tank was abandoned by it's crew so that it wouldn't fall into the hands of it's former owners. It doesn't appear to have any battle damage ( unless it accidentally drove into the marsh) and the hatches are all opened to; a.) let it sink faster b.) let the crew escape.
In either case this is an extrordianary find.

I have an Allied / Axis magazine with German Grille that was found in an Austrian river. It was also abandoned by it's crew at the end of the Second World War in order to keep it out of enemy hands.

This was a common practice throughout history to keep the enemy from using your equipment.

Jeff

Intersting to see how the paint resisted in such conditions!
Where is it, exactly?

http://www.diving.ee/articles/art035.html
check it out,,really kool,,inspired me to build the dragon kit of that t34

Marshes and bogs tend to have very low levels of oxygen - this prevents oxidization - (metal rust) & decay and so items stay in good condition.

Cracking pics!

The Patton Museum has a Stug found in similar conditions. The conditions in the bog actually help preserve the paint & metal (as quoted earlier) with the lack of free oxygen in the fresh water. I wonder how they found where it was?

That's a T-34 with a cast turret used by the germans

It's been amazing how many finds there have been in recent times of extremely well preserved WW 2 artifacts. Military Modelling magazine from a couple of years ago had photos of an early KV 1 being pulled from a lake.
Very interesting, thanks David.

Let's find a KV-2, will ya? I want to know how the turred looked like from the inside...

this website has a StugIII F? being pulled out of a Demyansk Bog still with the winter whitewash intact

http://www.detektorweb.cz/index.4me?s=show&i=2988&mm=1&vd=1


Note it even has Ostketten




/image.file[/img]

It's real, Ive seen AP news reports about it.

Not trying to drive traffic to my site or anything, but I have the YouTube video feeds downloaded HERE .

Here is the storyfrom AP.

Russian Tank Recovered In Lake After 50 Years

14 September 2000, a Komatsu D375A-2 pulled an abandoned tank from its archival tomb under the bottom of a lake near Johvi, Estonia. The Soviet-built T34/76A tank had been resting at the bottom of the lake for 56 years. According to its specifications, it’s a 27-tonne machine with a top speed of 53km/h.

From February to September 1944, heavy battles were fought in the narrow, 50 km-wide, Narva front in the northeastern part of Estonia. Over 100,000 men were killed and 300,000 men were wounded there. During battles in the summer of 1944, the tank was captured from the Soviet army and used by the German army. (This is the reason that there are German markings painted on the tank’s exterior.) On 19 September 1944, German troops began an organised retreat along the Narva front. It is suspected that the tank was then purposefully driven into the lake, abandoning it when its captors left the area.At that time, a local boy walking by the lake Kurtna Matasjarv noticed tank tracks leading into the lake, but not coming out anywhere.

For two months he saw air bubbles emerging from the lake. This gave him reason to believe that there must be an armoured vehicle at the lake’s bottom. A few years ago, he told the story to the leader of the local war history club “Otsing”. Together with other club members, Mr Igor Shedunov initiated diving expeditions to the bottom of the lake about a year ago. At the depth of 7 metres they discovered the tank resting under a 3-metre layer of peat.

Enthusiasts from the club, under Mr Shedunov’s leadership, decided to pull the tank out. In September 2000 they turned to Mr Aleksander Borovkovthe, manager of the Narva open pit of the stock company AS Eesti Polevkivi, to rent the company’s Komatsu D375A-2 bulldozer. Currently used at the pit, the Komatsu dozer was manufactured in 1995, and has 19,000 operating hours without major repairs.
The pulling operation began at 09:00 and was concluded at 15:00, with several technical breaks. The weight of the tank, combined with the travel incline, made a pulling operation that required significant muscle. The D375A-2 handled the operation with power and style. The weight of the fully armed tank was around 30 tons, so the tractive force required to retrieve it was similar. A main requirement for the 68-tonne dozer was to have enough weight to prevent shoe-slip while moving up the hill.


After the tank surfaced, it turned out to be a ‘trophy’ tank, that had been captured by the German army in the course of the battle at Sinimaed (Blue Hills) about six weeks before it was sunk in the lake. Altogether, 116 shells were found on board. Remarkably, the tank was in good condition, with no rust, and all systems (except the engine) in working condition.This is a very rare machine, especially considering that it fought both on the Russian and the German sides. Plans are under way to fully restore the tank. It will be displayed at a war history museum, that will be founded at the Gorodenko village on the left bank of the River Narva.

Hey guys,

Just like James noted, they keep finding bodies buried in bogs that are incredibly well preserved after hundreds even thousands of years.
The fact that it was completely buried in a bog means that little or no oxygen was present.
No oxygen, no oxidization i.e. rust.
Depending on the paint used, in probably inhibited rust.

German paint was issued in paste form and could be thinned by petroleum based thinners or, worse case scenario, contaminated fuel or water.
Paint thinned by water was notorious for wearing off quickly.
From the photos, the T-34 appears to be either Panzer grey or some green colour.
If it was painted Panzer grey, there's a good chance that it was painted when fuel based thinners were readily available.

Anyway, I can see a few cool looking dioramas popping up at the Model shows over the next few months.

Cheers

jjumbo

Upper-crust women have been using mud to try to preserve themselves for quite a few years, no surprise it works on tanks too

:-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-)

lol! Jokes aside the preservation really is incredible, that stug looked almost new! Now only if it had been in German three tone camouflage and not whitewash, we could finally put a few arguments to rest!

James