Air & Space Magazine: The Wisdom on Solomon
Air & Space Magazine, April / May 2008
AirSpaceMag.com
SOUNDINGS: Update
The Wisdom of Solomon
Page 12
>>> JUSTIN TAYLAN, who has been cataloguing and researching World War II Pacific theater aircraft wrecks since 1993, was recently detained by the Royal Solomon Island Police Force, along with three colleagues, and charged with entering the Solomon Islands illegally (“Mystery on Guadalcanal,” Dec. 2006/Jan. 2007). Last November the four explorers had come upon a salvage operation on Ballale Island. “We saw six Zero fighter, a Val dive bomber, and a Betty bomber being illegally removed,” Taylan reported on his website, www.PacificWrecks.com.
The group members pleaded innocent, saying they had crossed borders through a published port of entry and in accordance with Solomon Island law. After a December trail, a magistrate pronounced them guilty on all counts. The maximum sentence was three years in jail; the magistrate instead imposed a total fine of $108. Says Ralph Wetterhahn, who wrote about Taylan’s work for Air & Space, “I think the whole thing was orchestrated as a message for Taylan to stop mucking up the attempts by paying customers to steal wrecks.”
