P-38 Pilot Was Flying Bomber Escort Mission In New Guinea

The remains of a U.S. serviceman lost during World War II, have been identified and returned to his family for burial with full military honors.

U.S. Army Air Forces 1st Lt. Louis L. Longman, 26, of Clinton, Iowa, was buried April 12, in Rock Island, IL. On April 16, 1944, Longman was the pilot of a P-38J Lightning aircraft that departed Nadzab, New Guinea, as part of a bomber escort mission against enemy targets on the island. His aircraft never returned after the mission, a day that came to be known as “Black Sunday” due to the extensive loss of American lives. Due to the nature of the war and mission, search and recovery efforts were unsuccessful.

A Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) team was investigating sites in the mountains of Papua New Guinea in February 2005, when two villagers turned over human remains that they claimed to have recovered from a wartime crash near their village. The team was not able to survey the site at that time.

From 2007 to 2010, JPAC survey and excavation teams recovered additional remains and aircraft wreckage from the site.

To identify Longman’s remains, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFDIL) used circumstantial evidence and forensic identification tools such as dental comparisons and mitochondrial DNA, which matched Longman’s niece.

(P-38J Image from File)

FMI: www.dtic.mil/dpmo