Rescue teams on Monday, the 31st of March, recovered a sunken military vehicle from a swamp in Lithuania, carrying four US soldiers who are still missing, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and LRT.
The M88 Hercules armoured personnel carrier was recovered in the early hours of the morning, six days after a rescue operation was launched at the Pabrade military training ground near the Lithuanian border with Belarus.
“At 4.30 a.m. the retrieval was completed. Two M88 armoured personnel carriers were used, as well as two additional bulldozers,” Lithuanian Defence Minister Dovilė Šakalienė told LRT RADIO.
According to Šakalienė, the armoured vehicle weighed almost 70 tonnes and was stuck in the mud, which, due to the resistance, significantly increased its weight.
The Lithuanian defence minister said that the fate of the four soldiers was still unclear.
“We cannot talk about it at the moment because, first and foremost, there is no information about it yet, and even when we get information, it is firmly agreed that the Americans will be the first to make any announcement,” Šakalienė said on Monday.
The vehicle went missing on the 25th of March and was found on the 26th of March sunk in a swamp at the Pabrade training ground. A massive rescue operation was launched, involving hundreds of Lithuanian, Polish and US staff and dozens of vehicles.
New video from #Lithuania:
Footage from the military training area where teams continue efforts to recover the sunken M88A2 Hercules armored recovery vehicle used by 4 US soldiers who remain missing. It’s now estimated to be ~4m (13 ft) underwater, buried under 2m (6.5 ft) of mud pic.twitter.com/iwODzH9aS1— Vaidotas Beniušis (@BeniusisV) March 30, 2025
Lithuania, a member of NATO and the EU, has more than 1 000 US troops stationed in the country on a rotational basis.
A statement from the US Army in Europe earlier said the four soldiers were “conducting planned tactical training” at the time of their disappearance.