2 US WWII aircrash victims identified after N-E recovery

Guwahati: The mortal remains of two US airmen, whose plane carrying four American soldiers from Assam’s Jorhat to Hsin-Ching in China crashed in a remote valley of Arunachal Pradesh during World WarII, have been identified.

The US department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency (DPAA), which recovered the remains from the crash site in Arunachal’s Bhismanagar village in 2016, has confirmed that those were of 1st Lt Allen Turner and flight engineer Joseph I Natvick. The duo was flying a C-109 tanker aircraft.

During World War II, the US provided supplies to the Chinese Army by flying over the Himalayas, a route known as the “Hump”. Many of these aircraft went missing and were never found.

“Turner and Natvick, killed during World War II, were accounted for. On

July 17, 1945, both the members of the 1330 Army Air Force Base Unit, Air Transport Command, on board a C-109 aircraft, crashed in a remote area in India. All four passengers were declared dead,” the DPAA official stated in a statement.

According to US Army records, the last position report of the aircraft carrying aviation gasoline was over Pathalipam in Assam’s Lakhimpur. After the US government negotiated with India, the DPAA conducted field activities in Arunachal in 2016 and found some evidence which was examined by a joint forensic review committee comprising both DPAA and Anthropological Survey of India (AnSI) members. The remains and material evidence were later transported to a DPAA laboratory for analysis.

Subsequently, one set of remains was identified to be of co-pilot 1st Lt Frederick W Langhorst. However, another member of that same crew, Corporal Robert McAdoo, is still missing.

Gary Zaetz, founder and chairman of Families and Supporters of America’s Arunachal Missing in Action, said, “Restrictions by Indian authorities have allowed the US government to recover only three out of possibly 400 missing airmen in Arunachal.”

The majority of the episodes that led to the disappearance of hundreds of American soldiers in India during World WarII are said to have occurred over parts of Arunachal since the main air re-supply route from India to China was over the Himalayas.

Besides the DPAA, remains of four other US airmen were recovered earlier as a result of efforts by Clayton Kuhles, an independent investigator from the US. The crash site was discovered by Mr Kuhles in 2007.

The Indian government has also set up museum in memory of those who laid down their lives in World WarII. It is located adjacent to the historic Stilwell Road, a vital lifeline for the Allied Forces during World WarII to free China from Japanese occupation. .At the memorial remnants of the war and personal belongings of the soldiers have been preserved.

It also showcases traditional items from the indigenous Tangsa community. The memorial has preserved at least 833 graves, including mass graves of the people who were involved in construction of Stilwell Road.

Tour operators of the region are of view that memories of World WarII can turn the region into a major tourist attraction.