Post by carmedic on Apr 6, 2015 20:29:52 GMT
1st posted on the old GEC forum 24/01/08
It was a plane crash back in 1942 that wasn't discovered until 1947. Now, hikers made a frozen discovery in connection with a World War II plane crash.
Hikers found the frozen body of an airman, in October 2005, while scaling Mount Mendel Glacier in the Kings Canyon National Park.
It's believed the airman has been frozen in the glacier for decades until a pair of climbers got much more than ever imagined on a hike.
They were hiking, ice climbing ... it's a pretty popular ice climbing route in K.C. and what they noticed was the head and shoulder and a part of an arm of a person at the base of the glacier that had melted out over the course of this summer.
National Park Service representatives believe the serviceman was likely part of a crew aboard an AT-7 navigational training plane that crashed on November 18, 1942.
"When we got this report, we got the report of a person wearing a parachute with a patch that said U.S. Army Corp. There was no Air Force in 1942 ... that didn't come until 1947, or after World War II," said Alexandra Picavet, from the National Park Service..
In 1947, five years after the crash, hikers discovered a portion of the plane, along with four bodies. Recovery crews didn't know there was at least one airmen left behind.
An archaeologist and two U.S. park police officers went up to survey the area. A team of two camped nearby to preserve the scene until the body was recovered.
It's believed most of the plane is still preserved under the glacier above the spot the latest airman was found.
In November 2005, a military lab scientist said forensic experts working to identify the discovered frozen remains of a World War II airman have narrowed down the possibilities to four.
Dr. Robert Mann told CNN in an interview that analysts have singled out the plane the airman was aboard when it crashed in California some 60 years ago. Records show there were four crew members aboard that plane.
The Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command had been looking at 10 possibilities for the identity of the serviceman, whose body was found Oct. 16 2005, jutting out of solid ice atop a mountain in a national park.
Mann said the airman was a Caucasian male in his 20s and was between 5-foot-9 and 6-2. He said the man sustained massive trauma when the plane crashed.
Mann said he believes the lab will be able to identify the airman in a few weeks to a few months.
But he said it would not be as easy as matching DNA from the airman with relatives of the missing four crew members. There is a possibility that the pool of missing aircraft, and thus missing crew, may be larger than what analysts have concluded, he said.
"We don't want to just look at the material evidence we have and immediately jump to the conclusion that this is a certain individual. What we want to do is have the evidence speak for itself," Mann said.
Two forensic anthropologists and a dentist at Hickam Air Force Base on Oahu examend the airman's body, teeth and clothing.
JPAC, which operates the largest anthropological laboratory in the world, has identified more than 1,200 servicemen dating to World War I.
It usually works with skeletal remains, but has received well-preserved frozen bodies in the past, such as airmen who were found in a Tibetan glacier in 1993.
The U.S. Department of Defense determined the remains are those of Leo Mustonen, who was 22 when the plane he was in crashed 64 years ago in the Sierra Nevada mountains,
Leo Mustonen joined the war effort in 1942. He was on an AT-7 navigational training plane when it vanished after leaving on a routine flight Nov. 18 that year.
Five years later, after an engine, scattered remains and clothing were found far from the plane's intended course, the cadets and the pilot were given a ceremonial burial.
More than 60 years after he died in a crash, an airman whose body was frozen in a glacier is at last laid to rest.
New York Times and Associated Press
Published March 25, 2006
A World War II airman whose frozen body was chipped out of a California glacier last fall was laid to rest Friday in his hometown of Brainerd, Minn., more than six decades after the young man disappeared during a training flight.
Leo Mustonen's two nieces were among about 100 people who gathered at First Lutheran Church to say goodbye. A full military funeral followed at a cemetery overlooking the Mississippi River.
"This is one of the most unique and special days that any of us will ever be a part of," the Rev. Andy Smith said. "Today we are burying a small-town boy from Brainerd, Minnesota, who dreamed of flying."
Mustonen was 22 when his AT-7 navigational plane disappeared after takeoff from a Sacramento, Calif., airfield on Nov. 18, 1942. An engine, scattered remains and clothing were found over the following years, far from the plane's intended course. All four men aboard were killed in the crash.
But Mustonen's remains were not found until last year, when two hikers in California noticed something jutting out of the ice.
A military team arrived to cut him out, ice and all, and transported him to a remote laboratory at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, where anthropologists thawed him by spraying him with water.
A mummified human time capsule took its broken shape before them. He carried a Sheaffer fountain pen. The newest coin in his pocket was dated 1942. But his nameplate was terribly corroded.
His journey from the snow to the laboratory to the grave fulfills what a commander here calls the military's "most sacred of promises" to its members.
"We're going back to that basic promise we make to youngsters who enter the military," said Col. Claude H. Davis III of the Marines, deputy commander of the joint command, which works to find and identify the remains of Americans from all wars. "We're going to make sure they get home again."
So, forensic scientists analyzed bones, DNA samples and the airman's teeth, along with the corroded nameplate. Anthropologists used different sources of light to photograph the plate until they could read four letters: "EO A. M."
One of the dead men was listed as Leo M. Mustonen, age 22. Close to the nameplate, but with a different middle initial.
A piece of bone generated mitochondrial DNA, but for a match, a sample has to be drawn from a maternal relative. The lone relatives of Mustonen were the wife and daughters of his brother, in Jacksonville. Their DNA would not be of help.
But relatives of the other three men - John Mortenson, 25, of Idaho; Ernest Munn, 23, of Ohio; and the pilot, 2nd Lt. William Gamber, 23, also of Ohio - were found. None matched the airman's DNA.
Finally, anthropologists found that Mustonen's name had been misspelled on his nameplate all along. The A should have been M.
So by the nametag and genetic default, and "to the exclusion of other reasonable possibilities," the airman was identified as Leo M. Mustonen. His family was notified, and his remains cremated and shipped to Minnesota.
At the cemetery Friday, Mustonen was honored with a three-volley salute and a bugler playing taps.
His nieces, said at a news conference that they have been overwhelmed by stories about their uncle over the past few weeks.
Mary was 11 months old when her uncle died; Ross had not been born. "He really feels like he is ours now, and we've grown to love him," Ross said.
He was buried alongside his mother, Anna, who grieved for years over the loss of her son.
Ross said: "He's no longer out there on a mountain alone."
1100874-WorldWarIIAirmanFoundFrozeninGlacier.kmz (1.03 KB)
Hill, you made two very infromative replies to this post on the old forum, maybe you could transfer them over here
Original Thread here
It was a plane crash back in 1942 that wasn't discovered until 1947. Now, hikers made a frozen discovery in connection with a World War II plane crash.
Hikers found the frozen body of an airman, in October 2005, while scaling Mount Mendel Glacier in the Kings Canyon National Park.
It's believed the airman has been frozen in the glacier for decades until a pair of climbers got much more than ever imagined on a hike.
They were hiking, ice climbing ... it's a pretty popular ice climbing route in K.C. and what they noticed was the head and shoulder and a part of an arm of a person at the base of the glacier that had melted out over the course of this summer.
National Park Service representatives believe the serviceman was likely part of a crew aboard an AT-7 navigational training plane that crashed on November 18, 1942.
"When we got this report, we got the report of a person wearing a parachute with a patch that said U.S. Army Corp. There was no Air Force in 1942 ... that didn't come until 1947, or after World War II," said Alexandra Picavet, from the National Park Service..
In 1947, five years after the crash, hikers discovered a portion of the plane, along with four bodies. Recovery crews didn't know there was at least one airmen left behind.
An archaeologist and two U.S. park police officers went up to survey the area. A team of two camped nearby to preserve the scene until the body was recovered.
It's believed most of the plane is still preserved under the glacier above the spot the latest airman was found.
In November 2005, a military lab scientist said forensic experts working to identify the discovered frozen remains of a World War II airman have narrowed down the possibilities to four.
Dr. Robert Mann told CNN in an interview that analysts have singled out the plane the airman was aboard when it crashed in California some 60 years ago. Records show there were four crew members aboard that plane.
The Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command had been looking at 10 possibilities for the identity of the serviceman, whose body was found Oct. 16 2005, jutting out of solid ice atop a mountain in a national park.
Mann said the airman was a Caucasian male in his 20s and was between 5-foot-9 and 6-2. He said the man sustained massive trauma when the plane crashed.
Mann said he believes the lab will be able to identify the airman in a few weeks to a few months.
But he said it would not be as easy as matching DNA from the airman with relatives of the missing four crew members. There is a possibility that the pool of missing aircraft, and thus missing crew, may be larger than what analysts have concluded, he said.
"We don't want to just look at the material evidence we have and immediately jump to the conclusion that this is a certain individual. What we want to do is have the evidence speak for itself," Mann said.
Two forensic anthropologists and a dentist at Hickam Air Force Base on Oahu examend the airman's body, teeth and clothing.
JPAC, which operates the largest anthropological laboratory in the world, has identified more than 1,200 servicemen dating to World War I.
It usually works with skeletal remains, but has received well-preserved frozen bodies in the past, such as airmen who were found in a Tibetan glacier in 1993.
The U.S. Department of Defense determined the remains are those of Leo Mustonen, who was 22 when the plane he was in crashed 64 years ago in the Sierra Nevada mountains,
Leo Mustonen joined the war effort in 1942. He was on an AT-7 navigational training plane when it vanished after leaving on a routine flight Nov. 18 that year.
Five years later, after an engine, scattered remains and clothing were found far from the plane's intended course, the cadets and the pilot were given a ceremonial burial.
More than 60 years after he died in a crash, an airman whose body was frozen in a glacier is at last laid to rest.
New York Times and Associated Press
Published March 25, 2006
A World War II airman whose frozen body was chipped out of a California glacier last fall was laid to rest Friday in his hometown of Brainerd, Minn., more than six decades after the young man disappeared during a training flight.
Leo Mustonen's two nieces were among about 100 people who gathered at First Lutheran Church to say goodbye. A full military funeral followed at a cemetery overlooking the Mississippi River.
"This is one of the most unique and special days that any of us will ever be a part of," the Rev. Andy Smith said. "Today we are burying a small-town boy from Brainerd, Minnesota, who dreamed of flying."
Mustonen was 22 when his AT-7 navigational plane disappeared after takeoff from a Sacramento, Calif., airfield on Nov. 18, 1942. An engine, scattered remains and clothing were found over the following years, far from the plane's intended course. All four men aboard were killed in the crash.
But Mustonen's remains were not found until last year, when two hikers in California noticed something jutting out of the ice.
A military team arrived to cut him out, ice and all, and transported him to a remote laboratory at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, where anthropologists thawed him by spraying him with water.
A mummified human time capsule took its broken shape before them. He carried a Sheaffer fountain pen. The newest coin in his pocket was dated 1942. But his nameplate was terribly corroded.
His journey from the snow to the laboratory to the grave fulfills what a commander here calls the military's "most sacred of promises" to its members.
"We're going back to that basic promise we make to youngsters who enter the military," said Col. Claude H. Davis III of the Marines, deputy commander of the joint command, which works to find and identify the remains of Americans from all wars. "We're going to make sure they get home again."
So, forensic scientists analyzed bones, DNA samples and the airman's teeth, along with the corroded nameplate. Anthropologists used different sources of light to photograph the plate until they could read four letters: "EO A. M."
One of the dead men was listed as Leo M. Mustonen, age 22. Close to the nameplate, but with a different middle initial.
A piece of bone generated mitochondrial DNA, but for a match, a sample has to be drawn from a maternal relative. The lone relatives of Mustonen were the wife and daughters of his brother, in Jacksonville. Their DNA would not be of help.
But relatives of the other three men - John Mortenson, 25, of Idaho; Ernest Munn, 23, of Ohio; and the pilot, 2nd Lt. William Gamber, 23, also of Ohio - were found. None matched the airman's DNA.
Finally, anthropologists found that Mustonen's name had been misspelled on his nameplate all along. The A should have been M.
So by the nametag and genetic default, and "to the exclusion of other reasonable possibilities," the airman was identified as Leo M. Mustonen. His family was notified, and his remains cremated and shipped to Minnesota.
At the cemetery Friday, Mustonen was honored with a three-volley salute and a bugler playing taps.
His nieces, said at a news conference that they have been overwhelmed by stories about their uncle over the past few weeks.
Mary was 11 months old when her uncle died; Ross had not been born. "He really feels like he is ours now, and we've grown to love him," Ross said.
He was buried alongside his mother, Anna, who grieved for years over the loss of her son.
Ross said: "He's no longer out there on a mountain alone."
1100874-WorldWarIIAirmanFoundFrozeninGlacier.kmz (1.03 KB)
Hill, you made two very infromative replies to this post on the old forum, maybe you could transfer them over here
Original Thread here
Carmedic! Welcome! I'm not sure I saw this post the first time around, so glad it's here. I just did a post last night about the 2,000 WWI soldier's names found in an old chalk mine in France. The older I get, the more I appreciate this kind of story. It's awfully important.