The USS Ohio (SSGN 726) is scheduled to stop at Naval Station Pearl Harbor en route to the Western Pacific for its first deployment since being converted to a guided missile submarine.

USS Ohio, the first Trident submarine ever built, returned to the fleet February 2006 after a $250 million, one-year refueling and a $750 million, two-year conversion from a ballistic missile submarine. With this conversion, Ohio and the subsequent convert submarines provide the fleet with the ability to embark, deploy and provide command and control functions for special operations forces.

HPU STUDENT FILM SEEN IN MINNESOTA

A Hawai'i Pacific University student-produced documentary film was screened yesterday at the Minnesota Historical Society Greatest Generation Moving Pictures Film Project in St. Paul, Minn.

"First Shot: The Secret Submarine Attack on Pearl Harbor," produced by HPU advanced video students, is a 23-minute historical documentary that tells the story of how American naval reservists were doubted after they sank a Japanese midget attack submarine at Pearl Harbor, more than an hour before the air attack on Dec. 7, 1941. Commissioned by the USS Arizona Memorial Association, the film premiered in December 2005 at the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor and was broadcast statewide on KFVE Dec. 7, 2005.

"First Shot: The Secret Submarine Attack on Pearl Harbor," includes footage from the 2002 deep-sea discovery that solved more than 60 years of mystery surrounding the sinking, and led to friendship between two men who were once enemies. The documentary features historical re-enactments, archival footage and in-depth interviews with both USS Ward and Japanese Naval veterans.

The student-produced film won the 2006 Hawai'i Student Film Festival Platinum Award, the 2006 Association of Partners for Public Lands Media & Partnership Award, the 2006 Gold Aurora Award, and the 2005 International Communicator Crystal Award.

PILOT'S REMAINS IDENTIFIED, BURIED

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office at Hickam Air Force Base announced last week that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing from the Vietnam War, have been identified and returned to his family for burial with full military honors.

Maj. Robert G. Lapham, U.S. Air Force, of Marshall, Mich., was buried Friday in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C.

On Feb. 8, 1968, Lapham was flying the lead A-1G Skyraider in a flight of two in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. The aircraft were alerted to join an airborne forward air controller to destroy enemy tanks that had overrun the Lang Vei Special Forces Camp. After completing one pass on the tanks, Lapham was nearing his target on the second pass when he crashed.

Between 1993 and 1998, joint U.S./Socialist Republic of Vietnam teams, led by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, traveled to Quang Tri Province two times to investigate the incident and interview witnesses. One team also surveyed the crash site and found aircraft wreckage.

In 2003, another joint team investigated the incident and resurveyed the crash site. The team found more wreckage and pilot-related evidence, including Lapham's identification tag.

Between 2004 and 2006, Hawai'i-based JPAC teams traveled to Quang Tri Province four times to excavate the crash site. The teams recovered human remains, aircraft wreckage and pilot-related items.