| Veterans
News Flash 
Navy
Crew MIA From Vietnam War is Identified
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel
Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains
of five U.S. servicemen, missing in action from
the Vietnam War, have been accounted-for and will
be returned to their families for burial with full
military honors.
They are Lt. j.g. Norman L. Roggow, of Aurelia,
Iowa; Lt. j.g. Donald F. Wolfe, of Hardin, Mont.;
Lt. j.g. Andrew G. Zissu, of Bronx, N.Y.; Chief
Petty Officer Roland R. Pineau, of Berkley, Mich.;
and Petty Officer 3rd Class Raul A. Guerra, of
Los Angeles, Calif.; all U.S. Navy. Pineau was
buried on Oct. 8 in Arlington National Cemetery
near Washington, D.C. The dates and locations of
the funerals for the other servicemen are being
set by their families.
On Oct. 8, 1967, Zissu and Roggow were the pilots
of an E-1B Tracer en route from Chu Lai Air Base,
Vietnam, back to the aircraft carrier USS Oriskany.
Also on board were Wolfe, Pineau and Guerra. Radar
contact with the aircraft was lost approximately
10 miles northwest of Da Nang, Vietnam. Adverse
weather hampered immediate search efforts, but
three days later, a search helicopter spotted the
wreckage of the aircraft on the face of a steep
mountain in Da Nang Province. The location, terrain
and hostile forces in the area precluded a ground
recovery.
In 1993 and 1994, human remains were repatriated
to the United States by the Socialist Republic
of Vietnam (S.R.V.) with information that linked
the remains to unassociated losses in the same
geographical area as this incident. Between 1993
and 2004, U.S/S.R.V. teams, all led by the Joint
POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), investigated
the incident more than 15 times in Da Nang city
and Thua Thien-Hue Province.
Between 2004 and 2005, the joint teams surveyed
and excavated the crash site where they recovered
human remains and crew-related items. During the
excavation in 2005, the on-site team learned that
human remains may have been removed previously
from the site. S.R.V. officials concluded that
two Vietnamese citizens found and collected remains
at the crash site, and possibly buried them near
their residence in Hoi Mit village in Thua Thein-Hue
Province. In 2006, another joint U.S./S.R.V. team
excavated the suspected burial site in Hoi Mit
village, but found no additional remains. In 2007,
more remains associated with this incident were
repatriated to the United States by S.R.V. officials.
Among other forensic identification tools and circumstantial
evidence, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces
DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial
DNA and dental comparisons in the identification
of the remains.
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.
SOURCE:
U.S. Department of Defense
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