By Nazario Rodriguez Jr.
Horizon news staff

A crew from the mobile dive and salvage team from the US Navy is currently dive-digging the remains of eight American Air Force men aboard a B24-J plane that crashed in the waters of Aimeliik after being shot by the Japanese ground forces on Sept. 1, 1944.
The crew is part of the ongoing mission being undertaken by the Joint Prisoners of War and Missing-In-Action Accounting Command headed by Capt. George Mitroka.
Aside from the dive and salvage team unit, the other part of the mission are the explosive ordnance disposal, life support, archeologist and photographers (both underwater and ground).
Vice President Elias Camsek Chin visited the site on Friday March 9 along with US Charge d’ Affaires Mark Bezner to study the progress of the ongoing work.
Lt. Shasta Rouch, head of the 15-man mobile dive and salvage team, explained that the mission is to look for any evidence that would lead to the determination of those eight who perished while on a motivational trip around the area in the dead of night.
Rouch said there is an archeologist who is in charge of personal effects that could lead them to identify the bodies of every individual.
She was referring to Dr. Eric Emery, who however said that they could not reveal the names of those missing crew until the mission will close the site.
The mission started in 2005 but was delayed for a while last year due to the difficulty in securing environmental permits.
Mission members arrived on January 26 and the salvage team started digging the wreckage on Feb. 4.
Rouch said that the mission is set to end on April 2.
The wreckage is located into two areas, one for the tail and one for the front of the crashed B24-J Liberator plane, which usually accommodate 10-12 passengers.
"Our mission is to recover the remains and we want to bring them to the families for proper burial," said Emery, who explained that they have process of making sure that they would be able to identify that the missing individuals through their bones, dentures, personal belongings if there’s any.
He said that they have already identified three of the eight missing crews.
Using a suction dredge to vacuum the remains, the dive and salvage team put the debris from the wreckage in a large improvised screened-bucket, which will be sorted out by a specialist Senior Master Sergeant Dwayne Roberts.
Also assisting in the recovery mission is EODL Matt Goy, who specializes in bombs.
Goy explained that his responsibility is to look for hazardous materials.
He however assured that there are just some "not too dangerous" materials that the team found so far but some live bullets.