BBC News posted a very interesting article about the
discovery and excavation of a World War II RAF Spitfire that crashed into an Irish bog in 1941. Despite the damage from the crash, the properties of the peat bog preserved the remains of this vaunted British aircraft. The diggers were able to recover six of the eight Browning .303 machine guns carried in the wings. Experts cleaned and reassembled one complete gun using the workable parts from all six, and after 70 years, it still fires. There is a great video of the excavation and test firing.
The gun fired without a hitch. There can be no greater testament to the machinists and engineers in UK factories in the 1940s who, despite churning out guns at the rate of thousands per month, made each one of such high quality that they could survive a plane crash and 70 years underground and still fire like the day they were made.
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