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## News Release

# WWII Soldier Identified (McKain)

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that theremains of a U.S. serviceman, who was lost during World War II, have been identified and will beburial with full military honors.

Army Staff Sgt. James M. McKain, of Philadelphia, Pa., will be buried on June 20, in ArlingtonNational Cemetery near Washington, D.C. On May 7, 1944, McKain was aboard a B-24D Liberatorthat departed Nadzab, New Guinea, on a bombing mission. Due to mechanical troubles, the B-24D wasdelayed in departing the airbase and was unable to join the formation after takeoff. Neither McKain,nor the nine other crewmen aboard the plane were seen after takeoff. In 1946, the War Departmentdeclared all ten men to be presumed dead.

In 1973, an official from the Papua New Guinea Forest Department reported finding a wartimeaircraft in the mountains northwest of the city of Lae. In October 1973, a team from the RoyalAustralian Air Force (RAAF) responded to the report and visited the site, where they found aircraftwreckage that corresponded to a U.S. military B-24D. The RAAF recovered possible human remains,which were transferred to the U.S. Army Mortuary in Tachikawa, Japan. Given the limited technologyat the time, the remains could not be individually identified. In 1974, the remains of the crew wereburied as a group at Arlington National Cemetery.

In April 2008, a Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) team investigated and surveyedthe crash site. The team recovered additional remains and aircraft wreckage, including a radio callsigndata plate that matched the crews B-24D.

To identify the remains, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA IdentificationLaboratory used circumstantial evidence and forensic identification tools such as dental comparisonsand mitochondrial DNA, which matched McKain’s niece, grand-niece, and grand-nephew.

Today there are more than 400,000 American service members that were killed during WWII, theremains of more than 73,000 were never recovered or identified.

For additional information on the Defense Department’s mission to account for missingAmericans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.

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