Defense Department identifies three missing servicemen

WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (UPI) -- Remains of three servicemen missing from the Vietnam War have been identified and will be buried with military honors, the U.S. Department of Defense announced on Friday.

Army Maj. Dale W. Richardson, Staff Sgt. Bunyan D. Price, and Sgt. Rodney L. Griffin were identified by the Department of Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency. The remains will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery on October 20. All three were assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor Regiment, 25th Infantry Division, and were passengers aboard a UH-1H helicopter en route to Fire Support Base Katum in South Vietnam. They went missing after the craft was diverted due to bad weather, according to the Defense Department.

The helicopter carried four crewmen with an additional four passengers. The aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing in Cambodia after coming under heavy enemy fire. While the crew survived the landing, Griffin, Price and Richardson were killed during a fire fight with enemy forces. Three crewmen and one passenger were captured. The Vietnamese released two of the captured crewmen in 1973, and returned the remains of the other two crewmen roughly a decade later.

The site of the crash was examined by a joint team of U.S. and Cambodian personnel from 1992 through 2008 without success.

Scientists were able to identify the remains of Price, Griffin and Richardson using circumstantial evidence in combination with forensic identification tools, including matching mitochondrial DNA with family members.

There remain 1,626 American service members still unaccounted for from the Vietnam War