DOD’s POW/Missing Personnel Office has confirmed that 11 sets of remains are those of airmen missing since World War II. The airmen comprised the crew of a B-24J Liberator that was returning on April 16, 1944, from a bombing mission near Hollandia to New Guinea, where the bomber was last seen flying into bad weather. An investigation at the time determined the aircraft went down over the ocean and could not be recovered. A 2001 interview of a native of Papua, New Guinea, led DOD specialists in 2002 to a site at which they found wreckage showing the B-24’s tail number. Subsequent excavations and investigation of remains resulted in identification of the airmen. (Go here for a list of their names and hometowns.)
Aircraft readiness will suffer if Congress does not approve some $1.5 billion worth of spare parts the Air Force requested in its annual Unfunded Priorities List, sent to Capitol Hill last week, Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin said.