S3-B Crashes in Japan

Bill sent this to me yesterday and I just want you see what is going on in his life.

ABOARD USS JOHN C. STENNIS, At Sea (NNS) -- Navy S-3B Viking jets flew in the missing man formation over the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN 74) Aug. 15, as a 21-gun salute sounded across the flight deck during a memorial service for four aviators Aug. 10. More than a thousand officers and crew assembled on the flight deck to remember their four shipmates, lost when their S-3B Viking crashed in the Western Pacific. Lt. Patrick Sean Myrick, 31, of Santa Monica, Calif.; Lt. James Joseph Pupplo, 34, of Selden, N.Y.; Lt. Cmdr. Scott Allen Zellem, 35, of Indiana, Penn.; and Aviation Electronics Technician 2nd Class Joshua Brent Showalter, 24, of Fontana, Calif., were assigned to Sea Control Squadron (VS) 35, based at Naval Air Station North Island, Calif., when their aircraft impacted Kita Iwo Jima, an uninhabited island located approximately 39 nautical miles north of Iwo Jima. "The setting is poignant, notable and especially fitting. We are in historic waters accompanied by great ships of the line with names and lineage that represent the soul of our Navy. These waters have special meaning for us because it is here that our forefathers experienced triumph as well as tragedy," said the commander of the John C. Stennis Carrier Strike Group, Rear Adm. Patrick Walsh, during the ceremony. "Now we return to these hallowed waters to honor the pride of a new generation of four shipmates who started their life's journeys from four diverse parts of America. They were men of principle who answered the call of a wounded nation to lead a life of consequence and take risks for a cause larger than themselves. A cause and risk today that is equally as large to those who have gone before us," Walsh said. "We remember these four men as men of virtue, pride and commitment. We remember them as larger than life, yet as humble as they were brave," Walsh said. "I remember them as one team who chose to offer themselves for a simple, but noble purpose: to serve. "I offer my profound gratitude to the families who shared their sons, their husbands, their brothers and their fathers with us," he said. The ceremony concluded when two Sailors played "Taps" over the ship's silent decks.