We tend to \u201crib\u201d the Coast Guard as “not really the military”.\u00a0 But the guys and gals there do have a dangerous, stressful mission.\u00a0 And when under DoD control during wartime, they often take casualties too.<\/p>\n
During World War II, that happened quite a bit.\u00a0 One such instance occurred in Greenland during late 1942.<\/p>\n
A US Army Air Corps B-17 was forced to land on the Greenland ice cap.\u00a0 There were survivors.<\/p>\n
A Coast Guard crew of two \u2013 LT John Pritchard and RM1 Class Benjamin Bottoms \u2013 attempted to rescue the downed crew on consecutive days, flying a J2F-4 Grumman \u201cDuck\u201d.\u00a0 Appropriately, they were assigned to the cutter USS Northland<\/i> at the time.<\/p>\n
Rescue operations on 28 November 1942 went well, and rescued several of the downed B-17\u2019s crew.\u00a0 However, the following day was different.\u00a0 The J2F-4 piloted by LT Pritchard crashed that day.\u00a0 Lost were LT Pritchard, RM1 Bottoms, and Army CPL Loren Howarth (one of the airmen from the downed B-17 that they were evacuating).<\/p>\n
The location of the J2F-4 crash site was lost.\u00a0 Attempts were made to find it in 1975 in order to recover remains, but were unsuccessful.<\/p>\n
However, further attempts last year located the site.\u00a0 This July, the USCG sent a team to attempt to recover the remains of LT Pritchard, RM1 Bottoms, and CPL Howarth.\u00a0 They have a weather \u201cwindow\u201d until early September in which to conduct recovery operations.<\/p>\n