SSgt Robert E. Frank
U.S. Army Air Force (USAAF), Aerial Gunner B-24D "The Swan" 42-40475
43rd Bombardment Group (43rd BG), 63rd Bomber Squadron (63rd BS)
Background
On December 3, 1943 lost B-24D
"The Swan" 42-40475 pilot Captain Robert L. Coleman went Missing In Action (MIA) on an
armed reconnaissance mission. Fifty-nine years later, a wreck
tecs and John
Douglas discovered and visited this wreck. The
sad story of its missing crew came to light, being the MIA of the 11
crew members aboard. One of them, was a gunner, named Robert E. Frank.
Robert E. Frank Dog Tag
In 2003, Frank's dog tag was discovered by a local man, Trophy Ombri while hunting in the area. He came across the wreck site, and located the dog tag. As a former PNG soldier himself, he knew the importance of this dog tag, and brought it to the PNG
Museum.
Robert E. Frank
32303093
T42 43 A |
By coincidence, he met Justin
Taylan, of Pacific
Wreck Database and the PNG Museum curator, Mark Katakumb were
at the museum that morning. Taylan recognized the tag as
one of the crew members from the MIA B-24 John
Douglas had discovered the year before. A US
Army CILHI team had just arrived in Papua New Guinea the day
before, and were investigating
another B-24 crash
in Morobe Province, also from that same 5th Air Force, 43rd
Bomb Group unit. Tropy
expressed his intent to turn the tag over to CILHI personnel
when they return to Port Moresby after
their current mission, and will consider this wreck for future
MIA work.
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