Naval Reserve Lt. Richard C. Lannom, 27 Will Be Interred Saturday

Naval Reserve Lt. Richard C. Lannom, 27, of Union City, Tennessee, killed during the Vietnam War, was accounted for on Sept. 25, 2018. His remains have been returned to his hometown, and will be buried on Saturday.

According to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA), on March 1, 1968, Lannom, a bombardier-navigator assigned to Attack Squadron Three Five (ATKRON 35), USS Enterprise (CVA-65), was on board an A-6A aircraft on a night strike mission over Quang Ninh Province of North Vietnam. Radar contact with the aircraft was lost due to the low altitude of the aircraft, and the pilot had been instructed to turn his identification beeper off. The flight path to the target was over islands known to have light anti-aircraft artillery. When the aircraft failed to return to the carrier, a search and rescue effort was mounted. No evidence of the plane could be found. Lannom and his pilot were subsequently declared missing in action.

In August and September 2006, a Vietnamese Office for Seeking Missing Persons (VNOSMP) team interviewed three wartime residents concerning a crash site. One witness, reported traveling to the crash site on the top of a mountain in Na San Hamlet several times, finding a pilot’s helmet.

During a JFA in 2007, a witness stated that in 1968, he heard an explosion while he was sleeping. He went outside and observed an aircraft crash and explode on impact. He later observed scattered aircraft wreckage and personal effects.

Between October and December 2017, a VNOSMP Unilateral Team excavated a crash site below the peak of a steep mountain on the southwestern peninsula of Tra Ban Island. The team recovered possible osseous material, as well as material evidence and aircraft wreckage.

To identify Lannom’s remains, DPAA and the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis as well as circumstantial and material evidence.

DPAA is grateful to the government of Vietnam for their partnership in this mission.

(Image provided with DPAA news release)

FMI: www.dpaa.mil