BUCK, ARTHUR CHARLES Remains identified 12/20/02
Name: Arthur Charles Buck Rank/Branch: O2/US Navy Unit: Observation Squadron 67, Nakhon Phanom RTAFB, Thailand Date of Birth: 23 October 1941 Home City of Record: Sandusky OH Date of Loss: 11 January 1968 Country of Loss: Laos Loss Coordinates: 171800N 1055258E (WE938123) Status (in 1973): Killed/Body Not Recovered Category: 3 Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: OP2E Refno: 0982
Other Personnel In Incident: Denis Anderson; Richard Mancini; Delbert Olson; Michael Roberts; Gale Siow; Phillip Stevens; Donald Thoresen, Kenneth Widon (all missing)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 15 March 1990 with the assistance of one or more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews. Updated by the P.O.W. NETWORK 2003.
REMARKS: CRASH CNFM - WE 938123 - NO SERCH -J
SYNOPSIS: The Lockheed P2 "Neptune" was originally designed for submarine searching, using magnetic detection gear or accoustic buoys. Besides flying maritime reconnaissance, the aircraft served as an experimental night attack craft in the attempt to interdict the movement of enemy truck convoys. Another model, the OP2E, dropped electronic sensors to detect truck movements along the supply route through Laos known as the "Ho Chi Minh Trail".
The Ho Chi Minh Trail was used by the North Vietnamese for transporting weapons, supplies and troops. Hundreds of American pilots were shot down trying to stop this communist traffic to South Vietnam. Fortunately, search and rescue teams in Vietnam were extremely successful and the recovery rate was high.
Still there were nearly 600 who were not rescued. Many of them went down along the Ho Chi Minh Trail and the passes through the border mountains between Laos and Vietnam. Many were alive on the ground and in radio contact with search and rescue and other planes; some were known to have been captured. Hanoi's communist allies in Laos, the Pathet Lao, publicly spoke of American prisoners they held, but when peace agreements were negotiated, Laos was not included, and not a single American was released that had been held in Laos.
Delbert Olson was the pilot of an OP2E electronic observation aircraft assigned to Observation Squadron 67 at Nakhon Phanom, Thailand. On January 11, 1968, he and a crew of eight, including Denis Anderson, were dispatched on an armed reconnaissance mission over Laos. The aircraft lost radio and radar contact at 9:57 a.m. When the plane failed to return within a reasonable time, an extensive visual, electronic and photographic search was conducted in the area of the aircraft's last known position.
On January 23, a USAF A1 located a suspected crash site. On January 25th an O2 from the 23rd Tactical Air Support Squadron photographed the site. Using the photographs for photo interpretation, and in conjunction with visual air reconnaissance of the site, it was determined that the wreckage was that of Commander Olson's aircraft. The aircraft crashed on the northern side of a sheer cliff, 150 feet below the 4583 foot summit line, about 15 kilometers northeast of Ban Nalouangnua, Khammouane Province, Laos. It was decided that all indications were that there were no survivors and most probably no identifiable remains. Because of the heavy jungle canopy, irregular terrain and the close proximity of enemy forces, no ground team was inserted to inspect the crash site for remains. There was no indication as to the exact cause of the crash.
All members of the crew were placed in an initial casualty status of Missing In Action. On February 23, 1968, the crew was placed in a casualty status of Presumed Killed in Action/Body Not Recovered.
The crew of the OP2E lost on January 11, 1968 are among nearly 600 Americans lost in Laos. Because Laos was not a party to the agreements ending the war, no Americans held by Laos were ever released. Since the war ended, nearly 10,000 reports have convinced many experts that hundreds of Americans are still being held captive in Southeast Asia. While the crew of the OP2E may not be among them, one can imagine them proudly flying one more mission to bring home the evidence needed to bring them to freedom.
========================
Subject: Ohio Sandusky Register, Saturday Front Page Article
Leave No One Behind Saturday, January 12, 2002 -- Sandusky's Charlie Buck has been missing in action since Vietnam. A $20 million annual effort seeks to discover his fate and that of others who made the ultimate sacrifice.
By EMILY S. ACHENBAUM emilyachenbaum@sanduskyregister.com
SANDUSKY On an isolated, mist-shrouded mountain in eastern Laos, amid tangles of electrical wire and nests of venomous vipers, lies a clue to Sandusky's only Vietnam War veteran still classified as missing in action.
In Sandusky, a memory has been kept alive for 34 years. Gary Buck says he has moved on with his life, but still waits for closure in the death of his younger brother, a man he describes as "self-made."
Arthur "Charlie" Buck was once bedridden for a year with a mysterious illness when he was 9 years old. He recovered with a vengeance, building himself into an athlete and ultimately, lieutenant junior grade in the United States Navy.
In addition to leaving him bedridden for a year, Charlie's illness caused him a lot of pain in his legs. But he was a lifelong sports fanatic and wasn't going to let his passion get sidelined.
"He started exercising every day, lifting weights," said Gary, a retired contractor and U.S. Army veteran. "He got out of bed and didn't look back. He overcame a handicap and made himself into an athlete."
Charlie Buck played football and was on the wrestling team at Sandusky High School, graduating in 1960. He graduated from Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio, where he won a football scholarship, studied liberal arts and debated becoming a coach or going into business. Neither was to be.
"Charlie was a volunteer, and he wanted to be where the action was," Gary said. Charlie Buck belonged to secret squadron VO-67. Eight other men were in the group.
Their mission was secret. It stayed secret for years. They were to sprinkle the jungle with sensors so delicate they would detect footsteps or eavesdrop on hushed conversations.
Other planes would then be able to pick up transmissions from the sensors to bomb enemy convoys. On Jan. 11, 1968, 26-year-old Charlie and his eight crew members were aboard an OP-2E Neptune, a U.S. Navy patrol plane, when it went down in Laos. For years, his family only knew the mission was dangerous -- and very secret.
"He didn't consult anyone, he just went," Gary said. "Our parents were very proud of him."
None of the nine men have been officially recovered and identified, although recovery teams now scouring the area have found possible remains of two people. Parts of the plane have been found, although researchers are not sure if the plane was shot down or it crashed into the side of the mountain.
It has been 34 years since a naval officer brought the news of Charlie's disappearance to Gary and his late parents at their McArthur Park home.
"It was very shocking," Gary Buck said. "They said there was no chance of survivors from Charlie's crash, but without confirmation, you still have hope."
Military personnel who flew over the crash site and took photos said survival was unlikely. At first, Gary was told it was impossible to even reach the area where the plane had gone down.
Today, Gary describes the current efforts as "tremendous" because he believes the cause is of premium importance. "They need to make every effort," Gary said. He has been in contact with some of the other families of the squadron. Some follow the recovery efforts closely, making trips to Washington, D.C., doing anything they can to keep hope alive.
"For some of them, it's a way of life," he said.
Gary said he relates to the families and friends of the nearly 3,000 victims of the World Trade Center bombing and their need for closure. "You try to go on with your life. But now that there is the possibility that they might find remains -- it gives us hope."
Since 1973, the remains of 591 American servicemen lost in Vietnam formerly listed as unaccounted for have been identified and returned to their families. There are 1,950 Americans still unaccounted for from the war in Southeast Asia, the majority in Vietnam.
In 2000, President Bill Clinton became the first U.S. president to visit Vietnam since the war. The team working on the Neptune crash is part of a larger recovery operation -- the Hawaii-based Joint Task Force Full Accounting. It began in 1992 when the military created it to manage the recovery efforts in Southeast Asia, specifically looking for servicemen from the Vietnam War.
The task force has overseen 590 digs like Charlie's in the past decade, and is comprised of 161 investigators, analysts, linguists, and other specialists representing all four military services and Department of Navy civilian employees. The task force works with the United States Army Central Identification Laboratory, also based in Hawaii. CILHI search and recovery teams consist of members with specialized skills in anthropology, logistics, photography, explosive ordnance disposal, medicine, mortuary affairs, linguistics and radio communications.
CILHI has the largest staff of forensic anthropologists in the world and several hold the highest board certification in forensic anthropology. Each year, the task force receives $20 million a year for its operations in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, according to Lt. Col. Jerry O'Hara, the task force's spokesman, stationed at Camp H. M. Smith in Hawaii. He wishes the budget was even larger because the return on the investment is "priceless." "You ask anybody who works here, and they'll say we're working for the families," O'Hara said. "The moms, dads, wives, nephews -- we're working as hard as we can for them. People can begin to find closure for what happened during that war."
But the task force is not just about those who served in the past. "We're doing this for me," O'Hara said. "Me, and the million other guys and girls wearing the uniform. It is reassuring to know that if we make the ultimate sacrifice in service, someone is going to be working as hard as they can to bring us back." The force keeps family members up to date on the digs, and O'Hara said that the base often receives tips from Vietnam veterans who have returned to the country and have their own tips.
Nothing will make the snakes and cliffs any easier to deal with, but the task force acknowledges opportunities for recoveries have increased because of "an increased willingness by the governments of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia to share information they have regarding unaccounted-for Americans, as well as increased access to files, records, and witnesses in their countries."
"And the weather," O'Hara said. "That's a big factor."
Weather windows have set the schedule for searching the site of Charlie's crash, which O'Hara describes as "extremely dangerous" even without monsoons.
"You have to fly in by helicopter, hike through very thick jungle Р these guys have to rappel down a cliff to get at the site," O'Hara said. Parts of two bodies, yet to be identified, were found during the task force's first visit in March 1996.
It often takes months or years to identify the remains, O'Hara said, if they can be identified at all. Before the March 1996 trip, the team members investigated the possible site three times before digging. The last trip to the site was March 2001, and another trip is planned for February. Each trip lasts about 30-35 days, and a team of about 10 is sent.
Even the dedicated force must sometimes give up, although they leave that decision to the anthropologists.
"When they say there's nothing that can be determined from an artifact or from an area, we listen to them," O'Hara said. "But that's why we go to sites again and again. We have to be able to make an iron-clad case to families that we have done all we can for their loved ones."
==================================== 03/2002
CAMP H.M. SMITH, Hawaii (NNS) -- On a January morning in 1968, a Navy commander, three lieutenants junior grade, four petty officers second class and a petty officer third class climbed aboard their OP-2E Neptune aircraft and prepared for take-off. They would not live to see the sunset that day.
The nine Sailors were members of Observation Squadron (VO) 67, a squadron that operated secretly out of an airbase in Thailand during the Vietnam War. Their mission was to pepper the jungles of Laos with tiny sensors so sensitive they could be used to detect slight movements, or listen in on conversations. The sensors would be used to collect intelligence.
That January morning, three planes left the airstrip in Thailand with the same mission, but only two safely returned to the airfield. It was reported by another pilot that the last words of third aircraft's mission commander were simply, "I'm going down through this hole in the clouds."
What happened next is still a mystery. Whether they came under enemy fire or had a piece of navigation equipment malfunction is anyone's guess. What is known is that their plane went down on the side of a cloud-covered mountain in Laos, nearly a mile above the jungle floor, and for more than 30 years they lay untouched -- until now.
Thirty-four years later, Aircrew Survival Equipmentman 1st Class (AW) Nicholas Williams and Chief Hospital Corpsman (FMF) Paula Africa are searching for their fallen shipmates. The two are strapped in and nearly dangling at times from the side of a mountain, only 100 feet from the summit. They systematically search through grids on a 35-degree mud and rock-filled slope.
"This is an outstanding mission," Williams said as he passes buckets of dirt and chunks of aircraft wreckage to Africa. Williams is permanently assigned to Aircraft Intermediate Maintenance Detachment, Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, Wash., and volunteered to work as a life support technician augmentee with Joint Task Force-Full Accounting (JTF-FA) based in Hawaii.
The Bagley, Wis., native said he gladly volunteered, but wasn't sure if he could join the recovery teams that search for missing-in-action (MIA) 10 times each year in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. "My senior chief could only pick two of us to go out on this mission," the 16-year Navy veteran recalls, "and I was lucky enough to be selected."
The mountain was initially deemed too dangerous to attempt to excavate in 1996 when an investigation team located the crash site; but with the help of Army mountaineers, they decided it could be done. Last year, the crash site was excavated for the very first time; remains were repatriated and are in the identification process. This time around, it is fresh dirt, undisturbed remains and new pieces of the puzzle.
Williams and Africa are no strangers to the POW/MIA search-and-recovery efforts in Southeast Asia.
"I've done one mission in Vietnam and this is my second in Laos," said Africa. The Keuka Park, N.Y., native confesses, this mission is the most rewarding yet. "This is my third mission overall, but its the first time we've found remains at a site that I've been at. It's just so exciting because you know it may bring closure to a family that's been waiting for answers for a very long time," the chief said while taking a break from the bucket line.
Africa is assigned as a team medic at the U.S. Army Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii. The lab works very closely with JTF-FA and is responsible for positively identifying remains, either through dental records or coordinating mitochondrial DNA testing, if the bone fragment is large enough for the DNA-testing process.
While the team lives in a makeshift base camp on the mountain and hikes roughly 45 minutes up to the excavation site every day, their spirits remain high. It's the second time this site has been excavated, and this trip alone has been a huge success.
Some of the possible remains they've found are piece of a mandible with teeth still attached, several individual teeth, other pieces of osseous material and the largest piece, possibly a tibia. Teeth are considered the most sought after, because according to the anthropologists, they provide the best chance of making a positive identification.
Some of the most powerful material to hold and touch are items from their era. Some of the things the team recovered during this trip include wrist watches, a .38 caliber pistol, General Motors car keys, a 35mm camera, coins, a charred and slightly mangled pewter second class crow from a Sailors utility cover and dog tags.
To the Sailors working on the mountain, this particular site carries a lot of meaning and emotions. "Every mission is important," the chief insists, "but this mission -- searching for Sailors -- it's definitely extra special to me."
Today, there are still 399 Sailors and 242 Marines who haven't come home from the war in Southeast Asia.
============
Remains of Crew in Navy Plane Crash ID'd
The Associated Press Friday, December 20, 2002; 8:55 AM
HONOLULU нн The remains of all nine crew members aboard a U.S. Navy patrol plane that crashed in Laos during the Vietnam War have been identified, the Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii, announced Thursday.
The OP-2E Neptune crashed into the cloud-covered face of Phou Louang Mountain on Jan. 11, 1968, according to officials at Honolulu-based Joint Task Force-Full Accounting.
The crew was on a mission to drop sensors along the jungle floor to detect enemy troop movements and conversations.
Excavations began in 1996 after the crash site was located near the mile-high mountain summit, and the work was completed last February, the officials said.
Since 1973, the remains of 750 American service members formerly listed as missing or unaccounted for in Southeast Asia have been identified. There are currently 1,891 Americans still missing or unaccounted for.
2002 The Associated Press
================= http://www.thenews-messenger.com/news/stories/20030516/localnews/313835.html
Link
Vietnam War victim 'is no longer lost in the jungles'
By RICK NEALE Staff writer
PORT CLINTON -- For 35 years, Port Clinton native Arthur Charles Buck has waited on the side of an isolated cliff, a mile above the green jungles of Laos at the other side of the world.
Saturday morning, he's finally coming home.
"Charlie" Buck, a U.S. Navy Reserves lieutenant bombardier, was killed Jan. 11, 1968, during the Vietnam War when his OP-2E Neptune patrol plane plowed into the side of a foggy mountain. Eight other crew members died, and their remains were never recovered -- the crash site wasn't even discovered until April 1996, and the steep terrain was deemed too dangerous for American search teams to tackle.
But in March 2001 and March 2002, U.S. Navy recovery workers rappelled on ropes and used helicopter airlifts to finish an archaeological project at the site, retrieving bones, wreckage and personal effects. Buck's remains were identified at a Hawaii military laboratory in December, and he will be buried Saturday in Lakeview Cemetery.
"He's no longer lost in the jungles of Southeast Asia," Lt. Col. Jerry O'Hara said Thursday from his Hawaii office. "He's going to be laid to rest in American soil."
Buck was born in Magruder Hospital in 1941 to Wilson and Edith (Mills) Buck. The family lived in Gypsum until 1943, then moved to Sandusky, said his older brother, Gary Buck.
"Charlie" Buck graduated from Sandusky High School in 1961, attending St. Paul Lutheran Church in Danbury Township. He played football at Baldwin-Wallace College and enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserves in 1965.
He was soon shipped to Thailand, where he joined an air squadron that dropped surveillance devices along the Ho Chi Minh Trail and other enemy supply lines.
On the morning of the 1968 crash -- during a spy mission shrouded in overcast, foggy weather -- the OP-2E Neptune's pilot radioed that he was going to drop through a hole in the clouds, according to a synopsis from Task Force Omega Inc., a POW-MIA organization. At 9:57 a.m., the gunship vanished from radar and radio contact -- it had slammed into the side of Phou Louang Mountain near its 4,583-foot summit, far above the triple-canopied jungle below. All nine men aboard were killed, including the crew's mascot, a dog named Snoopy.
The cause of the crash is still a mystery.
On Feb. 23, 1968, Charlie and his crew mates were listed as Presumed Killed In Action/Body Not Recovered by a military review board. Gary Buck said he and his family were devastated by the news.
"We were close, and I'll always miss him," the 64-year-old retiree said Thursday, shaking his head in his Sandusky apartment. "And that's the best I can say."
Their mother died a few years after Charlie's death, Buck said, and their father passed away three years ago. "Most of the family members are gone. Most of the ones that are left are elderly and have physical health problems," he said.
In fact, Gary Buck only has one remaining photograph of his brother -- a U.S. Navy picture from 1967, he believes. "We had a house fire. I'm lucky to have that. All the records and everything were burned."
The recovery effort at the rugged Laos crash site has attracted national attention, including a July 2001 front page Parade Magazine article describing Buck and the other victims. The extensive effort was handled by the Joint Task Force-Full Accounting department, formed in 1992 to scour Southeast Asia for remains of missing American servicemen, and the U.S. Army Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii.
The Phou Louang Mountain expedition was "the most dangerous site JTF-FA and CILHI have ever attempted to excavate," according to the JTF-FA Web site. O'Hara, a spokesman for the group, said the plane's wreckage was strewn on and embedded in a towering cliff with a 35-degree slope.
"You know, for a while this case was looked at as a 'safety case.' We thought we would lose guys trying to find guys," O'Hara said. "The area we were working on was on the side of a very big mountain. This wasn't in a jungle. This was on the side of a cliff.
"We had to send guys to mountain climbing school before we even thought about a recovery operation to retrieve these guys."
During a final March 2002 recovery effort, O'Hara said investigators used ropes, bamboo platforms and helicopter airlifts to sift through the crash site. They found teeth and bone fragments, along with wrist watches, car keys, a pistol, coins and a camera, the Navy News Service reported.
The airmen's remains were shipped to CILHI for months of testing and analysis. Results were released in December, and Buck was identified -- three and a half decades after the accident.
"I'm just glad to have him home," Gary Buck said. "It's been very difficult."
Remains of all nine crew members and Snoopy were identified. Additional unidentified remains recovered from the crash site will receive a group burial June 18 in Arlington National Cemetery.
Buck's remains were flown from Hawaii to the mainland Wednesday, CILHI spokeswoman Ginger Couden said. He will be buried at 11 a.m. Saturday in Lakeview Cemetery.
A U.S. Navy honor guard from Toledo and VFW Post 2480 will perform military graveside services. Rev. Paul Birmingham of Ohio Veterans Home will officiate the ceremony.
Contact staff writer Rick Neale at 419-734-7506 or rneale@fremont.gannett.com. Originally published Friday, May 16, 2003