Texas Governor Rick Perry and his wife Anita are scheduled to help the BentProp Project team in the search for missing American servicemen in Palau.
Governor Perry and his wife will help assist the team for this year’s mission beginning this week before returning back to the U.S.
In a statement to the media, Governor Perry expressed, “somewhere in the waters of Palau, or deep within its marshy jungles, lie the answers some families have been waiting generations to hear.”
He added, “the BentProp Project has made a mission of finding those answers, and I’m honored to lend a hand to the 2014 expedition, both in the field, and in spreading the word about this exceptional program.”
In helping with the expedition on Palau, Governor Perry will also work with U.S. military veterans including Romus Valton “R.V” Burgin and Marcus Luttrell.
R.V served in the U.S. military during World War II where he fought in Palau in the Battle of Peleliu. Luttrell is a retired Navy Seal who is known for co-authoring the book “Lone Survivor” about the Operation Red Wings mission. The movie “Lone Survivor” played by American Actor Mark Wahlberg is based on this book.
The two vets along with Governor Perry and his wife will join the expedition along with a team from Stockbridge High School’s Advance Underwater Robotics Program from Michigan and the University of Delaware’s Scripps Institute of Oceanography.
Since arriving in Palau in early March, the BentProp Team has located an underwater crash site of an American torpedo bomber called TBM Avenger.