Comments on: Small blessings

By: larry

larry — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 18:11:28 +0000

Aircraft Type: A-6E / Mishap Category: ALPHA / Narrative: Failed to return from mission / Injuries: 2 LIMA

Sounds like one my brother told me about from when he was on the Nimitz during wargames off the North Cape of Norway in the mid-1980′s. It just disappeared. No radio transmission indicating trouble, no wreckage or debris, no nothing.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 12:05:12 +0000

CPT J, your post gave me shivers. But the good kind. For a moment, I felt like I was there.

By: Bryan Strawser

Bryan Strawser — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 05:52:03 +0000

It wasn’t too long ago that I recall reading a story on Defenselink News about a World War I MIA soldier whose remains had been recovered and returned to his family for burial.

More than two generations had passed – but he still had a family member that knew he was missing. From the time when my grandfather was a five year old boy.

Bryan

By: CPT J

CPT J — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 17:15:21 +0000

The forensic aircraft search for a plane missing for decades has more than a little element of spiritual guidance involved. Turn here, turn there, circle here, hover there. A minute flash of light on tiny scraps of metal. A subtle nudge inside. A different voice in the headphones –”Did you just say something?” you ask over the engine noise. Your living crew member replies “Just now? No –did you?”. By now you both know better than to look at each other. This is so common neither of you think its spooky any more. Your kneeboard log shows the time and the “additional inputs”. It’s your handwriting, but you really don’t recall making the entry.

You’re looking for friends you never met who would do the same for you. Of course they’re right there with you, helping in some way.
Where else would they be? Well, besides the cantina anyway.

“And Death shall have no dominion…”

By: Paul Powondra

Paul Powondra — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 15:18:58 +0000

Badbob, that sounds like the ’94 Hultgreen mishap that happened off SoCal. RIO got out OK after the Turkey rolled but “Revlon” was .4 sec too late and ejected into the water.

By: badbob

badbob — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 13:52:54 +0000

Everyone who takes that risk knows that whether in a prison camp, behind enemy lines or at the bottom of the ocean every possible attempt at recovery will be made to bring you home.

I remember a jet where control was lost and one got out, the other didn’t..

Came to rest in fairly deep water in SoCal. A squadron mate went down as crewmember in a DSRV several weeks later. They extracted the crewmwember with a mech type arm. His description of the event reverberates still.

Other friends and acquintances rest in water around the globe so deep, technology may never recover them. However, once or twice a year over my lifetime, from frozen wastes of the Artic to high mountain ridges in New Gunuiea, airmen lost in the past come home. As long as the US stands they will not be forgotten and may come home yet, in this world.