July 25, 2025 – The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA), in partnership with Project Recover and other experts in the field, has publicly announced that they have positively identified the remains of 2nd Lt. Jason K. Goldwater, who had been Missing In Action since 1943. 2nd Lt. Goldwater, a member of the 13th Air Force 42nd Bombardment Group “The Crusaders”, 69th Bombardment Squadron, was a B-25 Navigator.
The B-25 took off from Carney Field in Guadalcanal on the morning of July 10th, 1943. Because of poor visibility, the aircraft hit a tree, crashed into the sea just under 2 miles north of Koli Point, and sank to the bottom of the Iron Sound.
In spring 2017, following a successful exploratory mission, Project Recover deployed a team made up of scientists and professionals from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the University of Delaware to Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, to search for World War II-era aircraft associated with missing U.S. service members. Despite challenging dive conditions, they located and identified two aircraft, including a B-25 bomber missing since 1943 and linked to four MIAs. Project Recover completed a detailed site survey and submitted its findings to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA).
Andrew Pietruszka Ph.D., Team Lead on the 2017 mission, shares, “It is an incredible feeling to see our hard work come to fruition and to play a role in our nation’s duty to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom. Repatriating these service members recognizes their service and brings comfort and closure to families whose loss spans generations.”
The Project Recover team is incredibly grateful to have been part of the effort to bring home 2nd Lt. Goldwater.
About Project Recover
Project Recover is a nonprofit, public-private partnership involving the University of Delaware’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego to enlist 21st century science and technology combined with in-depth archival and historical research in a quest to find the final resting places of Americans missing in action since World War II. Project Recover is the only non-governmental organization (NGO) with full vertical capabilities in the POW/MIA recovery space that includes operational missions in both underwater and land environments.
Project Recover’s cutting-edge team of scientists, historians, archaeologists, engineers, and divers conducts research and surveys to discover new crash sites, fully document wreckage, and correlate wrecks to known MIA cases. That documentation can then be used by the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) to evaluate that site for the possible recovery of remains. DPAA is tasked with recovery and repatriation efforts, including notification of the families of these MIAs.
Project Recover has completed over 100 missions in 25 countries, discovered and documented more than 75 aircraft associated with MIAs, developed a growing database of more than 700 cases associated with more than 3,000 MIAs, accounted for over 90 missing-in-action service members, repatriated 28 American heroes, and anticipate additional identifications before the end of 2025.
https://www.projectrecover.org/
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