Ten thousand of them came. Trudging around the American Silver Bird with mouths wide open, which was a large, four-engine US Army Air Force bomber, one of the largest that the US Air Force sent into the sky at that time. And now it was in front of them, this flying fortress. «Look here,» they murmured, «at what had been lying at the bottom of the Lake of Zug for eight years, and now he's brought that bomber up, that son of a gun». And the daredevil stood contentedly at the cashier's booth, with his cigar casually hanging out of the corner of his mouth, and heard the cash registers ringing. The adults paid 1.10 francs, the children 55 centimes. And when he saw that the visitors leaving the exhibition grounds in muddy shoes, he sent four employees to clean the visitors' shoes for 30 centimes a shot. The hotshot, the "bomber conductor". Born in Gränich, named Martin Schaffner, at 19 he had already been a waste material dealer and later a gas station attendant in Suhr, with his civil name Martin Schaffner. A fox, a dealer, a good bloke. He had achieved what the Swiss Army had thought impossible and fished the Boeing B-17G out of the Lake of Zug. On August 23rd, 1952. The reason Schaffner had been looking for a bomber at all was a magazine from America. On the front page was a picture of a gas station with a B-17 bomber on its roof. Schaffner, who operated an auto repair shop with a gas station near today's Rundhaus in Suhr, had an epiphany. "The gasoline price war was merciless back then" A bomber was the perfect publicity stunt to attract customers. But you can't buy bombers in Switzerland. So Schaffner went with his brother Peter to the US Air Force Base at the Frankfurt Airport. Because heavyweight Schaffner is mistaken for a corpulent general, the brothers get into the guarded area unchecked. When the American soldiers notice the mix-up, they arrest the Schaffners as spies. But the mistake is quickly cleared up, they laugh and joke, getting on like a house on fire. After recovering from the shock, the Schaffner brothers are invited to dinner by the general. Although the Americans explain that they cannot sell them any war material, Schaffner is simply told to lift one of the U.S. Air Force planes that had crashed in Switzerland. And that is exactly what Schaffner does. The number of airplanes from all over that crashed or made emergency landings on Swiss soil during the Second World War is considerable, about 250. Many of these are American aircraft. The Americans salvaged their slightly battered planes and flew them back to England after the war. What was irreparable remained in Switzerland and was sold to scrap metal dealers. The Americans had no interest in collecting their scrap metal again. So Schaffner had a large selection. And because he likes things big, he chooses the B-17 bomber that crash-landed in the Lake of Zug in 1944. For two years he prepares to salvage the wreck with the nickname "Lonesome Polecat". He struggles for permits in Bern, reconstructs from photos and the statements from fishermen where the bomber should be located and has a raft built out of two huge fuel tanks, which is to serve as a lifting platform. Because he has no idea about aircraft recovery, Schaffner asks the Swiss Army where it would be best to wrap the steel cables around the aircraft, where the strongest point is. He is reluctantly given advice, with the remark that it was impossible to lift this bomber. Schaffner looks for a long time for a diver who is willing to carry out his mission. The wreckage is 50 meters deep. It is a life-threatening depth. At that time, divers were not supplied with air by an oxygen cylinder, but rather pumped by hand through a hose into the diving bell. Schaffner manages to inspire diver Gottlieb Scherrer to partake in the adventure, provided he build him a ladder down to the wreck. Schaffner has Scherrer attach the steel cables where he has been advised to do so by army experts. Two or three times a day Scherrer climbs to the wreck, for six weeks.
But the specifications are wrong. During the first attempt to salvage the almost 30-ton machine, the enormous forces tear the cockpit from the fuselage. Schaffner has the ropes wrapped around the plane again, this time at his discretion. And on the second attempt, in the early evening hours of 23 August 23rd, at exactly 6.15 pm, the three winches hoist the 30-ton bomber, 22.5 metres long and with a wingspan of 32 metres, to the surface. Schaffner managed to accomplish the feat. After two years of preparation and two months after the start of his work, the wreck is pulled ashore at what is currently the boat harbour in Zug. The media pounces on Schaffner, giving him the nickname "Bomber Schaffner". This pleases business-minded Suhrer, who is photographed in front of his "Flying Fortress" in every pose imaginable, recounts about the difficult recovery using weighty words; about the "air giant", about "wresting it from the bottom of the lake"; the journalists lap it up. And so do the Swiss. Visitors come to Zug from all parts of the country; on the first day alone there are almost 10,000 of them. Bomber Schaffner, recently laughed at for his interest in the rusty remains, makes a small fortune on his bomber. After Zug, he exhibits it in Cham, Basel, Biel, Lausanne and Bümpliz, until he finally sets it up at his gas station in Suhr. At the same time, Schaffner continued to fish for wreckage: in 1953 he lifted a B-17 bomber from the Lake of Greifen; as of 1954 he brought back a "Lancaster" from the Lake of Constance, as well as a sunken diving ship, five German bombers, a Swissair plane and three more fighter planes. He is even said to have received secret salvage requests from Germany and Austria. In a caricature, the "Nebelspalter" describes him as "Switzerland's most successful fisherman". In 1962, Bomber-Schaffner set out to salvage the steamship "Jura", which sank in the Lake of Constance in 1854. A wreck that appears snow-white due to the limestone that has settled on it over the course of more than 100 years - a "ghost ship", as the divers call it. Schaffner has big plans for the "ghost ship": he wants to set up a restaurant inside. But that remains a dream. After an operation due to his obesity (before the operation he is said to have weighed well over 210 kilograms) he falls ill with pneumonia. On October 5th, 1965, at the age of 45, Martin Schaffner dies in Baden. His first bomber is sold after his death. As of 1966, the aircraft is located in St. Gallen-Winkeln, in 1970 it is transported to St. Moritz-Bad and in 1972, apart from a few parts, it is scrapped - residents had been bothered by this witness of war.
Bomber Schaffner
