The Search for Remains and Material Evidence on World War II Bomber Crash Sites: Combining Geophysics and Traditional Archaeological Approaches

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Fulfilling a Nation’s Promise: The Search, Recovery, and Accounting Efforts of DPAA and Its Partners" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

During World War II, the United States and other countries lost many airmen in plane crashes. Crash sites vary considerably in size and complexity, with buried and near-surface components that must be located, assessed, and perhaps excavated. Geophysical survey is one way to improve the cost/time effectiveness of crash site investigations and recoveries. In this poster we explore how Ohio Valley Archaeology Inc., in partnership with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, used geophysical survey and excavation together to characterize portions of a B-24 crash site in France, along with transit mapping and RTK GNSS to georeference spatial data in a wooded setting. In addition to detecting the main impact crater, we argue that the geophysical data also may show the location of a wing and a secondary fall out zone created by the impact or post-impact explosion. Initial excavations, guided in part by the geophysical survey results, focused on the edge of the impact crater.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)   •
• Fulfilling a Nation’s Promise: The Search, Recovery, and Accounting Efforts of DPAA and Its Partners

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37867.0