The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Flying Cross to Lieutenant Aram Y. Parunak, United States Navy, for extraordinary achievement while participating in aerial flight as Pilot of a PBY patrol plane during a hazardous rescue in July 1942, when an Army Flying Fortress crash-landed on a Greenland ice cap. Locating the B-17 on a broad plateau, criss-crossed by gaping crevices and encircled by mountains of ice, Lieutenant Parunak, fully aware of the utter inaccessibility of the spot, made several flights to his base and back, dropping emergency supplies to the stranded crew. After intensive aerial survey, he discovered, about 12 miles from the crippled bomber, a diminutive artificial lake, formed in a shallow depression by melting ice from the surrounding slopes. Accurately estimating its size, then loading his plane with base camp equipment, he set the 15-ton flying boat down on the precarious ice cap and disembarked a rescue party. Two days later, as they and the crew trekked back, he guided them by air around the bursting canyons and spontaneous rivers that broke without warning across the frozen wilderness. Although the glacial lake had shrunk, he nevertheless made repeated landings, successfully evacuated every man, and each time lifted the PBY off the water with remarkable skill. A day later the base of the cup had cracked and drained the lake down a crevasse. By his superb airmanship and conquest over almost insurmountable obstacles, Lieutenant Parunak not only saved the lives of 13 men, but also established precedent for future rescues under similarly desperate conditions.