72-year-old wartime mystery solved | Globalnews.ca
The crew of a war plane that went missing 72 years ago during a training flight from Patricia Bay has finally been found.
The remains of four airmen were recovered earlier this month.
Their plane went missing on Oct. 30, 1942 on a navigation training exercise.
After the aircraft failed to return to the air force base, searches immediately following the disappearance did not locate the plane or any wreckage.
The four airmen on board were presumed to have died, and their names were listed on the Ottawa Memorial.
The wreckage was finally located on southern Vancouver Island in October 2013 by a logging company working in the area.
The crew members have now been identified as Royal Canadian Air Force Sgt. William Baird and British Royal Air Force Pilot Officers Charles Fox, Anthony William Lawrence and Sgt. Robert Ernest Luckock.
The recovery is a joint effort between the British Columbia Coroners Service and the Department of National Defence (DND).
Canada’s Department of National Defence and Britain’s Ministry of Defence have contacted surviving family members of the deceased to inform them of the recovery.
DND is working to plan for an internment ceremony to provide the airmen with a final honoured and appropriate resting place in a Commonwealth War Graves plot.
More than 100 aircrew lost their lives while flying out of Patricia Bay during the Second World War.
The crew of a war plane that went missing 72 years ago during a training flight from Patricia Bay has finally been found.
The remains of four airmen were recovered earlier this month.
Their plane went missing on Oct. 30, 1942 on a navigation training exercise.
After the aircraft failed to return to the air force base, searches immediately following the disappearance did not locate the plane or any wreckage.
The four airmen on board were presumed to have died, and their names were listed on the Ottawa Memorial.
The wreckage was finally located on southern Vancouver Island in October 2013 by a logging company working in the area.
The crew members have now been identified as Royal Canadian Air Force Sgt. William Baird and British Royal Air Force Pilot Officers Charles Fox, Anthony William Lawrence and Sgt. Robert Ernest Luckock.
The recovery is a joint effort between the British Columbia Coroners Service and the Department of National Defence (DND).
Canada’s Department of National Defence and Britain’s Ministry of Defence have contacted surviving family members of the deceased to inform them of the recovery.
DND is working to plan for an internment ceremony to provide the airmen with a final honoured and appropriate resting place in a Commonwealth War Graves plot.
More than 100 aircrew lost their lives while flying out of Patricia Bay during the Second World War.
