Two Missing in Crash of U.S. Bomber Off Honduras

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Military divers on Friday located some wreckage of a U.S. Air Force jet that crashed off the Honduran coast, but there were no signs of the two crewmen, the U.S. Embassy said.

“We believe the crew members of the aircraft died, although we have still not found the bodies,” said embassy spokesman Arthur L. Skop.

Skop said in a telephone interview that pieces of the wreckage were found 40 to 50 feet deep in Diamond Lagoon by U.S. military divers. The site is near a bay on the western edge of Punta Sal, a small port 217 miles north of Tegucigalpa.

In Washington, the Pentagon identified the crewmen as Capt. Ronald B. Schatz, 34, of New Hope, Pa., and Capt. Donald F. Benton Jr., 35, of Aberdeen, N.J., and said they were officially listed as missing. It said both men were married, that Schatz had two children and Benton had one.

The plane, an OA-37 bomber, crashed last week while on a training mission near Honduras’ northeast coast, south of Belize and far from the Nicaraguan border.

Skop said, “We don’t know for certain the causes of the accident, but apparently it was due to mechanical failure.”

He said the embassy was having trouble communicating with Punta Sal and had no further details.

A Pentagon statement said, “A board of military officers will be convened to investigate the cause of the accident.”

Schatz and Benton were on a training mission in connection with Big Pine III, the third in a series of joint military exercises conducted by the United States in Honduras. It is scheduled to end today.

The plane had left the northern city of San Pedro Sula and, according to the Pentagon, crashed at about 10:15 a.m. EST.

It said the plane was assigned to the 111th Tactical Air Support Group, a unit of the Air National Guard based at the Naval Air Station at Willow Grove, Pa.