November 10, 2022
Project Recover is a collaborative effort to enlist 21st-century science and technology in a quest to find and repatriate Americans missing in action (MIA) since World War II, in order to provide recognition and closure for families and the Nation.
Project Recover began as Dr. Pat Scannon’s vision to bring MIAs home from Palau in 1993. Formerly known as The BentProp Project, the organization has grown from a grassroots effort to a team of dedicated professionals and volunteers using innovative science to bring our MIAs home. Over nearly three decades, the team has located more than 50 US World War II aircraft associated with more than 185 MIAs in missions around the globe.
In 2012, Project Recover was informally founded in conjunction with a collaborative partnership between Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, and University of Delaware. In 2016, the partnership was formalized. In 2018, The BentProp Project officially changed its name to Project Recover. The organization works in close partnership with Scripps and UDel.
Dr. Pat Scannon, MD, PhD received his PhD in Chemistry from University of California, Berkeley and his MD from the Medical College of Georgia. He is board certified in Internal Medicine, having served his residency as an Army medical officer. After leaving the Army as a major, he started a biotech company, XOMA, in 1981 and served as chief scientist for 35 years. He founded Project Recover, formerly The BentProp Project, after a trip to Palau in 1993 to help locate the Japanese trawler George H.W. Bush sunk in 1944.
After locating and documenting the armed trawler, Pat and his wife hired a guide to show them other artifacts from World War II. It was then that Pat first saw the 65-foot wing of an American B-24 bomber lying in shallow water along a coral island in Palau. Other than leading him to it, the guide could give Pat no information about the wing. For Pat, the wing was more than a hunk of metal. It represented a forgotten battle and brave men who had fought and died there. It represented stories lost to the chaos of war, the annals of time, and the secret stillness of a watery grave. All were stories unknown to the airmen’s families.
This moment marks the inception of The BentProp Project which is now known as Project Recover. At that moment, however, there was no name; only a feeling. Pat felt determined to find the rest of the plane and, with it, the stories of the young men lost there that day. Pat is aware that, even now, this may sound strange, even absurd, to others. After all, if no one had found the aircraft or remains for the previous 48 years what made him think that he, with no relevant expertise, could or should? However, this was not the first time his inner guidance prompted a sharp turn toward a higher goal – nor would it be the last.