The DOD POW/Missing Personnel Office has identified the remains of an airman missing since the crash of an AT-7 aircraft during a Nov. 18, 1942 navigator training flight out of Mather Field, Calif. Aviation Cadet Ernest G. Munn of St Clairsville, Ohio, was one of four men aboard the AT-7. When it failed to return to base after it would have exhausted its five hours of fuel, officials launched a search that continued for about a month with no results. In 1947, hikers in the Sierra Nevada mountain range found AT-7 wreckage on Darwin Glacier. In 2005, other hikers discovered frozen human remains, circumstantial evidence, and personal effects that subsequently the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command identified as Cadet Leo Mustonen of the ill-fated flight. Other hikers in 2007 found more remains near the 2005 site that JPAC researchers identified as belonging to Munn.
The U.S. military is maintaining a beefed-up presence in the Middle East, including fighters and air defense assets, following the U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities June 22 and subsequent retaliation by the Iranians against Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.
