An Australian air gunner killed when his bomber was brought down in World War II will finally be laid to rest in Italy almost 70 years after the aircraft went missing there.
Warrant Officer John Penboss Hunt was just 21 when he died in April 1945.
But it wasn't until 2011 that Italian amateur archaeologists discovered the Boston bomber, brought down by anti-aircraft fire, near Ferrara.
An excavation subsequently revealed human remains and personal effects belonging to Warrant Officer Hunt and his fellow crewmen pilot David Raikes, navigator David Perkins and wireless operator Alexander Bostock.
All three Britons from the Royal Air Force (RAF) were aged 20.
Warrant Officer Hunt was the sole Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) member.
Wing Commander Wes Perrett has travelled to Italy with the air gunner's family.
Warrant Officer Hunt's half-brother Wes Madge will be at the burial service on Thursday along with his sons Darren and Ray.
The latter will play the Last Post at the Padua War Cemetery.
Warrant Officer Hunt was apparently eager to go to war.
"This was a young man who was desperate to fight for his country insofar that he used his brother's identification to enlist into the army at the age of 17," Wing Commander Perrett told AAP.
"He transferred to the airforce only 12 days after his 18th birthday.
"So this is a young man who was keen to fight."
Wing Commander Perrett said only 50 per cent of bomber crews survived.
More than 1100 RAAF airmen are still missing from WWII - many in Europe.
"Every time we can recover an airman who was previously missing and unaccounted for it actually completes the story for the family as well as the Australian airforce," Wing Commander Perrett said.
"We have somewhere where we can come and honour them."
RAF chaplain Paul Collins will conduct the burial service.
It will include a poem written by Sergeant Raikes, whose family posthumously published some of his work in the 1950s.
The padre said the bomber crew's families had probably put the ghosts of the past to bed many years ago and were now exploring their feelings again.
"That could prove quite difficult for them," he said.
"In their hearts they'd said their goodbyes."
The RAF chaplain said the service would, importantly, provide "formal closure" and a place to visit in years to come.
The graves will be looked after by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.
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