Posted on 04/12/2016 10:58:55 PM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
Seventy-two years after eight airmen in the B-24 Liberator Hot as Hell crashed in violent weather over India during World War II, part of the crew began their final journey home after a full-honors ceremony Wednesday, April 13, 2016, at Air Force Station Palam in New Delhi, India.
TARA COPP/STARS AND STRIPES
AIR FORCE STATION PALAM, NEW DELHI, India — Seventy-two years after eight airmen in the B-24 Liberator Hot as Hell crashed in violent weather over India, part of the crew has begun the final journey home.
In a full-honors ceremony Wednesday at New Delhi’s airport, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and a delegation of Indian and U.S. Defense Department officials looked on as bone fragments recovered from the crash site were carefully carried by U.S. Marines in a ceremonial box and placed in a transfer case. The Marines draped a U.S. flag over the case, then carried it onto a waiting C-17 transport plane.
“Now that we have them in our possession, we want to provide them with the respect that they deserve,” said Marine Capt. Greg Lynch, who led the repatriation team.
A second set of remains was also turned over Wednesday, “possibly related to a C-109 that crashed July 17, 1945, with a four-man Army Air Force crew," the Department of Defense said in a statement late Tuesday. DOD provided no other details on that second set of remains.
Both sets will be flown for DNA analysis at the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency laboratory in Hawaii.
Hot as Hell was flying Jan. 25, 1944, in a formation of five B-24s from the 308th Bomb Group, 425th Bomb Squadron, from China to India for a supply run when the group encountered extreme weather. The route took the group over the Hump, a treacherous eastern stretch of tall peaks in the Himalayas.
It was considered a highly dangerous mission – more than 600 aircraft crashed and more than 1,000 airmen were killed among the 15,000-foot mountains and frequent violent weather.
All five bombers crashed during the run. The crews in two of the aircraft were able to survive by parachuting out. In the third plane, two airmen survived. The last two bombers – Hot as Hell and sister ship Haley’s Comet – went missing and would not be discovered for decades.
The effort to bring Hot as Hell’s crew home began in 2006, when the crash site was reported by Clayton Kuhles, a mountain climber from Arizona. He also found the C-109 crash site from 1945.
The C-109 was also lost on the Hump during a flight from Jorhat, India, to Chengtu, China, Kuhles said. The C-109 is a modified Liberator that was used as a tanker aircraft.
When he found the C-109, Kuhles was able to identify the crash through a serial number he found in a panel from the plane's nose cone. Kuhles saw human remains, too, and wanting to help, gathered all he could and shipped them to DPAA for identification. An assistant returned to the location and delivered more of the remains to U.S. officials in India.
But human remains are not to be removed from crash sites or from India without the notification and permission of the host government, so those U.S. officials turned the remains over to the Indian government. Kuhles agreed not to remove any more remains he found as he continued his volunteer work to identify more sites.
On Wednesday, the C-109 remains that had been held by India joined the Hot as Hell crew remains and were flown home.
The return of the Hot as Hell crew remains took years. Attempts to execute a recovery effort at the Hot as Hell site were initially hampered by political sensitivities with India, but in late 2015 New Delhi approved a DPAA team to return to the crash site.
About 30 people – including explosives experts for any ordnance still at the site, military personnel, medics, Indian government representatives and archaeologists – combed two of four sections of the site for about a month. They carried soil and roots to a screening area to sift through, looking for possible remains. The exhaustive effort, which also involved Marines, resulted in two bone fragments. The pieces were so small they could fit in a sandwich-size plastic bag, DPAA India Desk Officer Gary Stark said. Those remains could be from one or two Hot as Hell crewmembers, he said, but DOD won’t know for certain until DNA analysis is completed.
It is not unusual to find few crew remains at a World War II crash site, as the bombers flew at speeds of several hundred miles per hour and could carry several hours of fuel. But the effort to find even the smallest evidence of a lost life is worth it, Stark said, as it gives surviving family members – often the grandchildren of lost crews – the chance to “have something to put in a casket … to bring to a cemetery and bury with military honors.”
Hot as Hell family members have questioned why only two of the four search sections were excavated, and wonder if more remains are there. Stark said an initial search of the remaining two sections revealed that under a shallow layer of soil there was shale on a steep slope that would have placed the recovery team members at too high a risk.
Photos Kuhles took of the Haley’s Comet crash site show large bone fragments and personal effects such as shoes and clothing. Family members wonder how long it will be before they receive the same type of closure.
There are an estimated 83,000 military personnel still missing from World War II; remains from about 350 are along the Hump, Stark said. DPAA is tasked to make 200 personnel recoveries a year. Several years ago, the agency came under fire after it was revealed it was reaching only about 72 sites per year. DPAA spokesman Jessie Romero said the agency has made improvements since then and DPAA is getting to about 95 sites a year, a number he said would continue to rise.
No India recoveries are planned for fiscal year 2016, and the agency has not finalized its 2017 recovery plan, Romero said.
Four men were on the C-109 Liberator tanker when it crashed July 17, 1945.
1st Lt. Allen R. Turner, pilot
2nd Lt. Frederick W. Langhorst, co-pilot
Cpl. Robert L. McAdoo, radio operator
Pvt. Joseph I. Natvik, flight engineer
THE LOST CREW OF HOT AS HELL
Eight men were on the B-24 Liberator bomber when it crashed Jan. 25, 1944.
1st Lt. William A. Swanson, pilot
1st Officer Sheldon L. Chambers, co-pilot
1st Lt. Irwin Zaetz, navigator
1st Lt. Robert E. Oxford, bombardier
Staff Sgt. Charles D. Ginn, engineer
Staff Sgt. Harry B. Queen, radio operator
Sgt. James E. Hinson, gunner
Sgt. Alfred H. Gerrans Jr., gunner
The long trip home. Glad they finally made it back. If they were able to look around I am sure they would wonder what they had given theirs lives for exactly.
One of the men who sponsored my membership in the ANAF Veterans in Canada was one John Harley, one of the many incredibly brave young pilots who laid their lives on the line for freedom by flying over “The Hump”.
In a way I am glad he has long since passed on. Though I miss him and his charming wife Hilda a LOT, I think he would be utterly mortified by what we have become.
Unfortunately there is a missing graveyard. The brave men of the United States Army Air Force and those of the Royal Army Air force are missing with rare exception. Few of their remains exist and were recovered. Perhaps when you look up in the sky on a beautiful summer day in England and see the clouds that is their graveyard.
"There are an estimated 83,000 military personnel still missing from World War II......"
The overwhelming majority of these were lost at sea. In that sense, we know where they are.
“”There are an estimated 83,000 military personnel still missing from World War II...”
That’s more than 1.5 times the number of KIA’s lost to the war in Vietnam.
“”There are an estimated 83,000 military personnel still missing from World War II...”
That’s more than 1.5 times the number of KIA’s lost to the war in Vietnam.
My dad was a C-46 Hump pilot in the China-Burma-India Campaign.
My Dad and all my uncles were with the all Chinese-American 14th Air Service Group in the CBI Theater.
The picture of the ceremony show soldiers, not Marines as cited in the article. the video shows a joint color guard with sailors, airmen, soldiers and Marines. Editors used to correct these careless errors.
Dad was actually a civilian pilot for the Army Air Force. He wore Army-issue clothing with the CBI patch but no insignia of rank.
Well, if this is what you get from Stars and Stripes, I can’t imagine how bad the mainstream press can get!
I’m sure that the writer is a stringer who takes any gig she can find, but even the regulars aren’t any better.
Thanks for this.
I have a great-great uncle who is still missing. Went down in the S. Pacific theater but there were some islands they could have made it to. Stories give us hope that someday his remains will be found. These men are not forgotten. They are ‘remembered’ by family members who were born long after they were gone through family stories handed down about them. Great and great-great descendants will keep up the vigil.
RIP.
I have a friend who recovers world war 2 aircraft wrecks down in the islands.One of the wrecks the remains of the pilot were still aboard.The bird was a P-39 airacobra.The folks in Hawaii have been notified and are sending a team out to effect the recovery of the pilot missing since IIRC 1943.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.