The Body Hunters

17 July 2008 | 11:28 - By Documentaries @ SBS

Friday 25 July 8:30pm
A three-part series that follows the JPAC team as they try to identity deceased US soldiers from around the world using forensic techniques and trawling through archived records in order to give families and descendants answers about lost loved ones.

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70,000 servicemen are missing from the Second World War alone, but unlike other countries, the United States has never stopped looking for their war dead. Any find of a potential American missing-in-action body brings the unique JPAC (Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command) team into action.

The mission of the US Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command Team (JPAC) is to search for, identify and bring home any fallen US servicemen from all previous wars.

Episode One: The Unknown Soldier
Friday July 25, 8.30pm

Private Francis Lupo was killed during the infamous Battle of the Marne in 1918. His story gives a unique insight into the US involvement in the First World War in France. In a uniquely difficult case the team piece together clues, and for the first time in decades dental records allow them to identify the Unknown Warrior and return him to his home and family for burial.

Episode Two: The Iron Coffin
Friday August 1, 8.30pm

On 9 March 1862, the epic American Civil War Battle of Hampton Roads pivoted around the first contest between ironclad ships, and the revolutionary new design of The Monitor. Less than ten months later, The Monitor sank in a storm. In 2002, two remains were found that could have been those of any one of the 16 men on board. This episode follows the complex investigation of the forensic team as they try to uncover the identities of the deceased.

Episode Three: Missing in Action
Friday August 8, 8.30pm

In 1967, at the height of Operation Rolling Thunder, the most intense aerial campaign of the Vietnam War, two pilots - Major Herman Knapp and Lt David Austin went missing after they were shot down close to the border of Laos. This episode follows JPAC''s search for Knapp and Austin forty years later and also tells the story of Helena Knapp, who wants the search for her husband to stop.

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Documentaries portray powerful themes and critically engage with the SBS Charter, a principal function of which is to provide broadcast programs which reflect Australia's wonderfully diverse multicultural society.