A specialized U.S. Navy dive crew and a unit of Polish Armed Forces engineers were traveling Friday to a training site in Lithuania to help with the recovery of four U.S. soldiers who were first reported missing Tuesday.
U.S. and Lithuanian personnel were still working Friday to access the site where the soldiers’ M88 Hercules armored vehicle was found 15 feet underwater Wednesday in a swamp on a training site near Pabrade, Lithuania. Thick mud and soft ground were keeping emergency personnel from accessing the vehicle and complicating the multiday recovery effort.
Maj. Gen. Curtis Taylor, commanding general of the 1st Armored Division, said in a statement Friday it would be a “long and difficult recovery operation.”
“The area around the site is incredibly wet and marshy and doesn’t support the weight of the equipment needed for the recovery of the 70-ton vehicle without significant engineering improvements,” U.S. Army Europe and Africa said in the statement. “Draining the area has been slow and difficult due to groundwater seepage.”
By Friday, the second full day of the recovery mission, subject matter experts from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had arrived on site. Authorities also brought in a large-capacity slurry pump, cranes and more than 30 tons of gravel.
The Polish Armed Forces volunteered a unit of military engineers to help in the recovery. Its 150 personnel, water pump and tracked recovery vehicles were on their way to the site Friday, as was a Navy dive crew from Commander Task Force 68, headquartered in Rota, Spain. The crew was expected to join the recovery efforts within the next 24 hours.
Before being reported missing, the soldiers, all part of 1st Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, had been conducting a maintenance mission to recover another Army vehicle. The initial search included military helicopters, Lithuanian diving teams and hundreds of U.S. and Lithuanian soldiers and law enforcement officers looking through thick forests and swampy terrain.
Since Wednesday, personnel have focused on the area where their armored vehicle was found. Around the clock, they’ve been working to drain water and dredge mud from the site to better stabilize the ground, the Army said.
The service has held off confirming the fates of the four soldiers, and their names had not yet been released Friday. The Army said it was keeping the families of the soldiers updated on the situation.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda and Kara C. McDonald, the U.S. ambassador to Lithuania, joined Taylor at the site Friday to “gain a better understanding of the complexity of the operation,” an Army release said.
“We are absolutely committed to bringing our soldiers home,” Taylor said in the release. “I remain incredibly impressed by the discipline, commitment and camaraderie in this unit as they attempt to recover their missing comrades.”
Nikki Wentling is a senior editor at Military Times. She’s reported on veterans and military communities for nearly a decade and has also covered technology, politics, health care and crime. Her work has earned multiple honors from the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, the Arkansas Associated Press Managing Editors and others.
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