HOLT, ROBERT ALAN Remains Identified 06/04/99
Name: Robert Alan Holt Branch/Rank: United States Marine Corps/O3 Unit: VMFA 542 MAG 11 Date of Birth: 13 June 1942 Home City of Record: READING MA Date of Loss: 19 September 1968 Country of Loss: North Vietnam Loss Coordinates: 171327 North 1064243 East Status (in 1973): Killed In Action/Body Not Recovered Category: 2 Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: F4B #152232 Missions: Other Personnel in Incident: John Lavoo, KIA/BNR Refno: 1281
Source: Compiled by P.O.W. NETWORK from one or more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews and CACCF = Combined Action Combat Casualty File.
REMARKS:
CACCF/CRASH SOUTH VIETNAM/AIRCREW/3 YRS United States Marine Corps/QUANG TRI
No further information available at this time.
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Defense POW/MIA Weekly Update June 4, 1999
TWO SERVICEMEN IDENTIFIED
The remains of two American servicemen previously unaccounted-for from the war in Southeast Asia have been identified and are being returned to their families for burial in the United States.
They are identified as Capt. Robert A. Holt, USMC, Reading, Mass.; and Capt. John A. Lavoo, USMC, Pueblo, Colo.
On Sept. 19, 1968, Holt and Lavoo were flying their F-4B Phantom on a combat mission over Quang Binh Province, North Vietnam. After they launched their rockets at the target, their aircraft appeared to pitch very slightly without breaking its dive. It then pulled suddenly to the right 90 degrees, then back 45 degrees. It crashed amid a large explosion. No parachutes were observed and no beepers were heard by their wingman.
The wingman and another tactical control aircraft made low passes over the wreckage, but saw no evidence that the crew survived. An additional electronic search yielded no indication of survivors. The hostile ground threat precluded any search and rescue efforts.
In July 1992, a joint U. S./Vietnamese team, led by the Joint Task Force-Ful l Accounting, visited the suspected area of the crash and interviewed several informants with firsthand knowledge of the site. One of the informants turne d over remains they said were taken from the site. The team also examined some aircraft wreckage in the possession of the villagers.
Another joint team reinterviewed one of the informants in August 1993, while another team in January 1994 surveyed the site again and recommended it for excavation. Then in May 1994, excavation team members recovered numerous pilot-related items as well as human remains.
A fifth team continued the excavation in June and July 1994 and recovered additional remains and pilot-related artifacts. A sixth team completed the excavation in August and September 1994, recovering some artifacts, but no remains.
Anthropological analysis of the remains and other evidence by the U. S. Army Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii confirmed the identification of both of these servicemen. With the accounting of these two, there are now 2,061 Americans unaccounted-for from the Vietnam War. Since the release of American POWs in 1973, 522 MIAs from Southeast Asia have been accounted-for and returned to their families for burial with full military honors.