Adam Gray, New Project Recover Team Member

Project Recover welcomes Adam Gray, our newest Project Recover team member. Adam accepted the offer while on a recent mission to Palau in April 2019. Adam, along with his mother, Cindy Gray, traveled to Palau to join the team. 

Adam’s great uncle, ARM2c Albert “Bud” Rybarczyk, USNR, was Missing in Action during World War II. Project Recover located his great uncle’s downed WWII aircraft in the waters off Palau in 2014. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency recovered Adam’s great uncle’s remains. In December 2017, the family buried ‘Uncle Bud‘ next to his parents in Michigan.

Adam Gray, Master Electrician, History Buff

Adam, 35, is a Master Electrician who runs Gray Electric with his brother in southwest Michigan. Until recently, he led a fairly routine life until Project Recover invited the Gray family to join them in Palau April 2019. Project Recover also told him he could dive his uncle’s WWII crash site if he got his SCUBA diving certification. 

In a matter of months, Adam got his SCUBA diving certification and got 20 dives under his belt. Adam went SCUBA diving enough to ensure he could dive down 100’ with Project Recover and see his great uncle Bud’s TBM Avenger.

Adam said that diving on his uncle Bud’s crash site was ‘surreal.’

WWII Enthusiast

Adam is a history buff and a World War II enthusiast. He is a team player and prefers to be hands-on in the field instead of at a desk. He is an excellent researcher and passionate about Project Recover’s  MIA project. 

Adam Gray is not the first MIA family member to be invited to become a Project Recover team member. Casey Doyle, grandson of SSgt. Jimmie Doyle, became a team member in 2010. More recently, Scott Althaus, lead researcher on the Kelly Family Research Team and first cousin once removed of 2nd Lt. Thomas V. Kelly, Jr., became a team member in 2018.

Pat Scannon, Project Recover founder, asked Adam to join the Project Recover team on the last night of his trip. Adam said being invited to become a Project Recover team member was ‘the greatest honor’ of his life.

“I’m thrilled to have the chance to do for other families what Project Recover has done for ours,” Adam said.

Project Recover is honored to have Adam Gray on board and looks forward to working together to bring MIAs home.

Read More About our MIA Families

• Albert P. “Bud” Rybarczyk, WWII Radioman, Buried After MIA for 73 Years
• MIA Family Travels To Palau with Project Recover to Uncle’s Crash Site
• Finding ‘Heaven Can Wait’; Family Shares MIA Research