Eight caskets holding the remains of unidentified service members killed on the battleship USS Arizona in 1941 were disinterred Sunday at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, the first of 86 to be exhumed for identification, Stars and Stripes reported on Nov. 6.
Related: Japan and U.S. Expand Okinawa Patrols After Marine Murder Indictment.
What happened
The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency held a dignified transfer Monday, taking the remains to its forensic lab at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Stars and Stripes reported. The Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Delaware will do the DNA testing, according to the report.
Pentagon policy requires a high probability that DNA can identify remains before groups of unknowns are disinterred, and that threshold was met earlier this year, Stars and Stripes reported.
Why 86 graves
The Arizona’s forward magazine exploded during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, and the ship sank in less than 10 minutes, killing 1,177 crew members, Stars and Stripes reported. The remains of more than 900 sailors and Marines are still entombed in the hull beneath the memorial.
Eighty-eight people believed to be Arizona crew were buried as unknowns at the cemetery, known as the Punchbowl, according to the report. Researchers later found that two of those graves held casualties from another ship, leaving 86 Arizona unknowns.
What families said
Kevin Kline, whose great-uncle died on the ship and remains missing, called the exhumations a “historic moment for our USS Arizona families” in a Facebook post, Stars and Stripes reported. Kline founded Operation 85 in 2023 to help the Defense Department collect DNA from relatives.
What happens next
More than 700 relatives of Arizona crew members are expected at a Dec. 7 ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam marking the start of the identification project, Stars and Stripes reported. More coverage is in Military.
Sources
- Stars and Stripes: First graves of USS Arizona unknowns exhumed in project to ID missing crewmembers
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