WINDHAM: Organization is dedicated to discovering forgotten crash sites. lost remains
Last month I wrote an article on the Aluminum Trail. During World War II, the United States made airplane supply runs between India, Burma (now Myanmar) and China to support Chinese and American forces fighting the Japanese.
Because the supply route was over the dangerous Himalayan Mountains or "Hump," there were many airplane crashes. Some say more than 700 planes and more than 1,600 pilots, crews and passengers were lost. The crashes left aluminum from the planes scattered from India to China, hence the name Aluminum Trail.
Because of the response I had on the article in October, I wanted to continue the story of the Aluminum Trail. I received a lot of questions, such as what happened after the war was over to document where planes crashed and were there efforts to recover any remains of the men?
During the latter years of WWII ,the military did try to find crash sites and recover remains. After the war into the late 1940s, recovery continued. However, with the Korean War and the Vietnam War, the focus on recovering remains of servicemen in the Himalayas was quickly overshadowed. Families of the missing men were left without closure.
In the mid-1970s, there was a renewed effort by the Department of Defense to account for Americans who are missing in action. Over the years the remains of hundreds of MIA servicemen have been identified in locations around the world, including along the Aluminum Trail.
The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency is a new agency created this year by the merger of three organizations, including what was known as the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command. DPAA investigates the possibility of remains being at a certain site. This includes dealing with sometimes not so cooperative governments and sending a team to investigate. If remains are found, a recovery effort can last for months. The identification phase is painstaking, but the release of remains to the family gives a sense of closure.
Over the years, private citizens have joined the effort. In the early 2000s, Clayton Kuhles, a businessman from Arizona who was an avid hiker in the Himalayas, became very interested in these crash sites. While on a trek into Burma, one of the guides mentioned a crash site of a plane. Kuhles asked the guide to take him there. This opportunity turned into a consuming quest to find other crash sites and to document what he found in each place. The ultimate goal was to locate remains and contact families to give hope of bringing their relatives' remains home.
Kuhles established an organization called MIA Recoveries Inc., which provided the framework for going into the Himalayas and doing searches. Kuhles pays for the searches out of his own pocket and from whatever donations he can get from others. There is no government support, financially or otherwise.
The process from discovery to getting remains to a family can be long and arduous. Kuhles hears of crash sites through guides and local villagers, especially older people who may have actually seen the crash.
Getting to a crash site is dangerous. The terrain is unforgiving, the weather unpredictable and there are poisonous snakes. Once at the site, MIA Recoveries begin to search for evidence as to the plane's identity. Finding a tail number is the best scenario. However, many times other pieces of evidence must be sought, like a construction number, or part number that would reveal the exact plane.
A crashed aircraft site report is placed on MIA Recoveries' website. It gives the model and serial number of the plane, GPS coordinates, a map from satellite imagery, wreckage and artifacts found, and if there were any human remains, among other information. Family members are notified if there are remains or dog tags at the site. DPAA is also notified.
Kuhles, through his organization, has reached 26 sites to date. Identification could not be completed on four of the sites because of the sites being heavily salvaged by a nearby village. The sites identified accounted for 193 missing U.S. personnel. The work MIA Recoveries is doing is monumental in helping the families of the missing. They give another avenue for finding lost servicemen.
The story of the Aluminum Trail will never end. It is comforting to know, however, that somewhere in the rugged mountains and treacherous jungles of India and China, there are people searching for the lost.
Marilyn N. Windham is a volunteer for the Museum of Aviation. She can be reached at mnwindham@aol.com