Colerne Spitfires - buried or smelted?
Perhaps worth putting in the picture is the fact that large numbers of Spitfires, and presumably other aircraft, were collected at Colerne and smelted into aluminium ingots on site by John Dale Ltd who recruited some labour locally.
Photographs exist of the line ups in 1948 and indeed one of the aircraft P7350, now BBMF, was saved just in time over a drink in the bar with the John Dale manager and that was because it was an early model and looked interesting.
The P-40 leg with no aluminium attached sounds like it could be steel residue post smelting.
PeterA