![]()
?(Image from The Aviationist)Pat Epps, founder of Epps Aviation at the Dekalb Peachtree Airport (PDK), has died at the age of 91. Epps was one of the leaders in the recovery of Glacier Girl, a Lockheed P-38 Lightning World War II fighter plane from the Lost Squadron.
Epps first flew solo in a Piper J-3 Cub at age 16, according to AOPA. He graduated from Georgia Tech with a degree in engineering, was a flight test engineer for Boeing and served in the U.S. Air Force as a co-pilot on the C-97 Stratofreighter. Later, he was a Mooney aircraft dealer for Alabama and Georgia and was a driving force for PDK. During the 2000s, he performed in airshows with his Beechcraft Bonanza F33C.
He was inducted into the Living Legends of Aviation and the Georgia Aviation Hall of Fame and led the Greenland Expedition Society. The society led the recovery of Glacier Girl. The aircraft was originally lost in 1942, when 2 Allied aircraft formations had to make an emergency landing in Greenland, according to the Smithsonian magazine. The formations, called Tomcat Green and Tomcat Yellow, were en route to Reykjavik, Iceland, when storms blocked their way. When attempting to return to base in Narsarsuaq, Greenland, heavy overcast blocked their view. The pilots were forced to land on the glacier and had to wait over a week for rescue. The pilot of Glacier Girl, Harry Smith, destroyed his Identification Friend or Foe radio and all the aircraft were abandoned on the ice.
RELATED STORIES:
Sergei Sikorsky, son of Sikorsky Aircraft founder, dies at 100 years old
Last WWII Ace fighter pilot in America dies at 103 years old
Declassified records on Amelia Earhart released to National Archives
The P-38 Lightning is considered one of the rarest objects on Earth. It took 12 years, 13 expeditions, ground-penetrating radar and almost a million dollars to find the aircraft and extract it from under 265 feet of ice. It had to be extracted in pieces, and while nothing was missing from the aircraft, almost everything was broken. It was restored in Middlesboro, Kentucky with 80 percent of its original parts and was able to fly again on October 26, 2002. It won the 2003 Rolls-Royce Aviation Heritage Trophy and is now part of the Lewis Air Legends collection, which showcases airshows and special events.