Wireless Op/Air Gunner. Initial Training School Victor Harbour SA, 1941. Wireless Air Gunnery School Ballarat VIC, 1941-42. Service Flying Training School Uranquinty NSW, 1942. Operational Training Units East Sale VIC & Jervis Bay NSW, 1943. 100 Sq New Guinea, Bristol Beaufort, 1943. NAA. When the Pacific War broke out, Tom Burrows was called up to fight as a wireless air gunner in Papua New Guinea. About 10pm on December 14, 1943, Tom took off on his first bombing mission in a Beaufort Bomber A9-211, one of nine Squadron 100 planes involved in an air attack. "The mission was to fly over and bomb Rabaul, which at that point was a well-held Japanese base," nephew Robert Burrowes says. But the weather was terrible that night and the mission did not go to plan. "Only three [planes] made the target … two bombed alternate targets, four returned to base without even completing the mission," Mr Burrowes says. "Tragically, one plane did not return to base." That was the aircraft Tom was on, alongside Flight Sergeants John Kenny, Arthur John Davies and Murray Fairbairn. Mystery of the missing plane The aircraft was never located, and from that night, the whereabouts of Tom and his crew remained a mystery. 82 years later the plane wreckage has been found. See FEATURE STORY article.