Ronald Franklin Golinski – Colonel, United States Army

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A military chaplain and two other officers went to Mickey Golinski’s apartment in Howard County on Friday to inform her that there was nothing left to bury of her son, Columbia resident Ronald Golinski.

“It’s sad,” Golinski said. “It breaks your heart.”

The family had hoped to bury Ronald Golinski, a retired Army colonel who was working in a civilian job at the Pentagon, at Arlington National Cemetery. Instead, they will have to settle for placing a plaque at Arlington.

“We will not be able to use a casket, because they don’t have any part of his body,” she said.


Retired Colonel Ronald Golinski, a Department of Army Civilian, killed on duty in the Pentagon. Lieutenant General Plewes (Ret.) recalled how happy Golinski had been a short time before September 11 at his daughter’s wedding. Golinski was a retired AGR officer.

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From a contemporary press report

Unidentifiable remains of victims of the September 11, 2001, attack on the Pentagon will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery, the military said Friday.

The September 12, 2002, ceremony will hold special significance for families of five people whose remains have never been identified, said Colonel Jody Draves, a spokeswoman for the Military District of Washington, which oversees the cemetery.

The service will include burial of the cremated ashes of all remains not linked to a particular victim, as well as some remains which were identified that family members asked to be included.

“The intent is not as a memorial service but as a group burial for victims not identified,” Draves said.

The Pentagon attack killed 189 people: 125 in the Pentagon and 64 aboard American Airlines Flight 77. Remains of the five hijackers on the flight have been separated from those of the victims.

The five victims whose remains have not been identified include:

Retired Army Colonel Ronald Golinski, a civilian Pentagon worker

Navy ET1 Ronald Henanway

Rhonda Rasmussen, a civilian worker for the Army

JamesT. Lynch, a civilian worker for the Navy

Dana Falkenberg, a passenger on Flight 77


Many relatives will also attend a group burial September 12, 2002, at Arlington National Cemetery honoring the 184 victims who were killed at the Pentagon or on the plane that was crashed into the building when five hijackers took control. Remains from many of the victims will be placed in a single casket and buried in a grave site marked with a headstone bearing all the victims’ names.

The unique ceremony at Arlington will include a funeral service at the Memorial Amphitheater near the Tomb of the Unknowns, the first time the amphitheater will be used for such a service since an unknown service member from the Vietnam War was buried there in 1984 during an emotional Memorial Day ceremony with President Ronald Reagan. Those remains were exhumed in 1998 for DNA tests, which showed that they were of Air Force Captain Michael Blassie.

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