Missing Plane

By Wolfgang Weichardt

The steep mountains and dense jungles of New Guinea swallowed up the wreckage of about 350 crashed Allied aircraft during World War II and few have been found. This story of the discovery, excavation, and identification of the remains of the pilots and crew of one B-24 tells in understated fashion the ripples of anguish sent out by this isolated tragedyfrom the effect on the recovery team and the Army forensic specialists in Hawaii who carefully assemble the few weathered bones to reveal their identity, to the victims' families, drawn again 39 years later into mourning. A slim though affecting look at a facet of war too easy to overlook. Mel D. Lane, Sacramento, Cal. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0399131833
• ISBN13: 9780399131837
• Release Date: October 1986
• Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
• Length: 201 Pages
• Weight: 0.92 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A Missing Plane and the cost of war.

This book reminds us of the ultimate cost of war. We visit a crashsite that lies undisturbed where it was swallowed up in a New Guinea rain forrest decades before. The plane lies in pieces with many articles curiously intact, and unidentified bones lie strewn about. It was my first introduction to identifying the dead from the dna stored inside, as I read this long before CSI ever hit the airwaves. What stuck me most was...

A Missing Plane (What is this "ABOUT"??

I wish "Book Titles" would be more descriptive (at least in "Sub-Titles") [Who, What, When, Where, Why] It took me awhile, to find out this book was about... [Who] - "WEEZIE" 5th AF, 90th BG, 320th BS[What] - WWII B-24 Liberator Heavy Bomber (found)[When] - 1980s[Where] - 30 miles northeast of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, Australia [Why] - I won't give away any secrets! You'll have to read the "Book"... Images of "WEEZIE"...

An interesting, well-documented book

The author discusses the discovery of a crashed bomber in Papua New Guinea and the expedition to recover the remains, then describes the painstaking process of identifying the remains, and finally tells the story of the fatal flight and the men who were on the aircraft. This was an interesting book throughout; especially poignant were the descriptions of the family members who finally learned the fate of their loved ones...