The Pentagon has identified the remains of three Army Air Forces airmen missing in action since 1941. They are: 2nd Lt. Augustus J. Allen, Myrtle Springs, Tex.; SSgt. James D. Cartwright, Los Angeles; and Cpl. Paul R. Stubbs, Haverhill, Mass. The three, who were assigned to the 39th Observation Squadron, flew from France Field in Panama, on June 8, 1941, in an O-47A bound for Rio Hato, Panama, but never arrived. Air and ground search forces found no trace of the airmen or the aircraft. In 1999 a man hunting in mountainous Panama Province spotted wreckage. In August 1999, a DOD team surveyed the area. It would be February 2002 before a team excavated the site. To read more, click here.
NASA, SpaceX, and United Launch Alliance are all preparing to launch their next-gen rockets from Florida’s Space Coast, two of them before the year is out. One is expected to liberate the U.S. launch enterprise from its reliance on Russian-made RD-180 engines, while all three rockets could eventually carry astronaut crews.