LONG WAIT NOW OVER

THE brother of the pilot who went missing during World War II initially didn’t believe the site of his crash had been located.

Townsville woman Denise Evans said her 92year-old father Wallace Oliver was in tears after learning of the fate of his brother James Percival Oliver who was 22 years old and the captain of the Catalina A24-50 which crashed on September 2, 1943.

“Dad used to talk about him as much as he could remember,” she said.

“It’s really good he has closure before he passes and I’m really happy for Dad that he finally got closure for his brother.

“He didn’t believe it at first, and insisted there was no way he (James) could have flown over that area in New Guinea. It was not the route that they took … but when we showed him the number on the plane he started getting tears in his eyes.”

Nearly 76 years ago, 10 Australian men went missing aboard RAAF No. 11 Squadron Catalina A24-50.

The airmen vanished on a sea mining operation to Sorong in occupied Dutch New Guinea, leaving families who never found out what happened to them.

The RAAF Historical Unrecovered War

Casualties team left the RAAF Base Amberley on July 14 for a recovery mission in Indonesia at the crash site of the Catalina aircraft which they identified.

Recognisable pieces of wreckage include two sections of the wing, engines and propeller, and the empennage (rear part of fuselage).

James Oliver was the eldest of six children, and when he died all his other brothers were fighting in the war leaving his youngest brother Wallace to be pulled out of school at the age of 11 to help his mum on their property in Victoria.

“It hurt him a lot not knowing where his older brother was,” Ms Evans said.

Ms Evans said she and her family hoped to travel to a memorial service in

Cairns later this year which would be held by the Defence Department in honour of the men.