The remains of a World War II Chicago airman were found and identified earlier this year in India, nearly 80 years after he died in a plane crash.

2nd Lt. Walter B. Miklosh, 21, was the navigator on a B-29 Superfortress that took part in a June 1944 bombing raid against a steel mill on Japan’s Kyushu Island.

Returning from the attack, their plane crashed into a rice paddy in Sapekhati, a village in eastern India, killing the entire 11-man crew, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.

A rescue team initially recovered and identified the remains of only seven men, and Miklosh was declared “non-recoverable” in January 1948. Miklosh served in the Army Air Forces in the 678th Bombardment Squadron of the 444th Bombardment Group.

The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command searched the crash site again in October 2014, and the wreckage was excavated in 2018 and 2019 and additional evidence and remains were found.

Finally, in May, the remains of Miklosh were identified by scientists from the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and Armed Forces Medical Examiner System who used material evidence and Y chromosome analysis.

Miklosh will be buried in Sierra Vista, Ariz., though no date has been set. He is memorialized on the Walls of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines.