More than a hundred WW2 aircraft rest on the bottom of Lake Michigan, just off the Chicago shoreline. This is the story of how they got there. During the Second World War, the US Navy trained over 15,000 carrier pilots on two makeshift ‘flattops’, both former coal-fired, side-wheel passenger steamers. Not every pilot landed successfully on the pitching decks of the USS Wolverine and USS Sable, and many aircraft went to the bottom of Lake Michigan. This is the story of the recovery of those rare warbirds and the ingenious training programme that changed the course of the war in the Pacific.

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