World War II: Fragments of US Aircraft recovered in Tripura

Agartala, Jan 14: 66 years after the end of World war II, the debris of the US military aircraft crashed during the war, have been recovered in northern Tripura, defence sources claimed on Saturday.

"After more than 66 years of being considered unrecoverable by many, the remnants of an American aircraft, C-47B, which crashed during World War II, were recovered by a team of 34th Battalion of the Assam Rifles last week in northern Tripura," an army official told the mediapersons.

The broken pieces were recovered at the remote tribal village of Birmani Para in the Dhalai district in northern Tripura.

"A series of search operations had been launched since September last year to find out the crash site in the thick and dense forests of all three hill ridges of northern Tripura -- Baramura, Atharamura and Longtrai. Finally, our troopers achieved success last week," said the official.

During the war, hundreds of aircraft were lost by the Allied forces, army official claimed.

"The majority of Allied crashes were caused by inhospitable weather, mechanical failure or navigational errors. The American Joint Prisoners of War and Missing in Action Accounting Command (JPAC) had identified 16 known crash sites in northeast India where Allied forces aircraft had crashed during World War II," the official said.

"On May 17, 1946, the ill-fated C-47B aircraft crashed in Tripura along with 11 members, due to heavy storm conditions while transporting the remains of Allied POW (Prisoners of War) from Yangon (erstwhile capital of Burma now Myanmar) to Calcutta.

The 34 Battalion Assam Rifles under the aegis of the para-military's 21 sector headquarters in Agartala was tasked to find out the details of the aforesaid aircraft and accordingly launched the hunt," official added.

The official said that it was difficult to recover the broken pieces due to the inconvenient terrain of the area and long time back, planes were.

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