KNEBEL, THOMAS EDWARD
2009 - see story below
Name: Thomas Edward Knebel Rank/Branch: E3/USAF Unit: 41st Tactical Airlift Squadron, Ubon Airbase, Thailand Date of Birth: 11 Hybe 1947 Home City of Record: Midway AR Date of Loss: 22 May 1968 Country of Loss: Laos Loss Coordinates: 162000N 1063000E (XC843858) Status (in 1973): Missing In Action Category: 4 Acft/Vehicle/Ground: C130A Refno: 1187
Source: Compiled from 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 in 2009.
Other Personnel in Incident: Jerry L. Chambers; Calvin C. Glover; John Q. Adam; William H. Mason; William T. McPhail; Thomas B. Mitchell; Gary Pate; Melvin D. Rash (all missing)
REMARKS: CONTACT LOST - NFI
SYNOPSIS: The Lockheed C130 Hercules aircraft was a multi-purpose propeller driven aircraft, and was used as transport, tanker, gunship, drone controller, airborne battlefield command and control center, weather reconnaissance craft, electronic reconnaissance platform; search, rescue and recovery craft.
In the hands of the "trash haulers", as the crews of Tactical Air Command transports styled themselves, the C130 proved the most valuable airlift instrument in the Southeast Asia conflict, so valuable that Gen. William Momyer, 7th Air Force commander, refused for a time to let them land at Khe Sanh where the airstrip was under fire from NVA troops surrounding that base.
Just following the Marine Corps operation Pegasus/Lam Son 207 in mid-April 1968, to relieve the siege of Khe Sanh, Operation Scotland II began in the Khe Sanh area, more or less as a continuation of this support effort. The C130 was critical in resupplying this area, and when the C130 couldn't land, dropped its payload by means of parachute drop.
One of the bases from which the C130 flew was Ubon, located in northeast Thailand. C130 crews from this base crossed Laos to their objective location. One such crew was comprised of LtCol. William H. Mason and Capt. Thomas B. Mitchell, pilots; Capt. William T. McPhail, Maj. Jerry L. Chambers [SEE NOTE BELOW], SA Gary Pate, SSgt. Calvin C. Glover, AM1 Thomas E. Knebel, and AM1 John Q. Adam, crew members.
On May 22, 1968, this crew departed Ubon on an operational mission in a C130A carrying one passenger - AM1 Thomas E. Knebel. Radio contact was lost while the aircraft was over Savannakhet Province, Laos near the city of Muong Nong, (suggesting that its target area may have been near the DMZ - Khe Sanh). When the aircraft did not return to friendly control, the crew was declared Missing In Action from the time of estimated fuel exhaustion. There was no further word of the aircraft or its crew.
The nine members of the crew are among nearly 600 Americans who disappeared in Laos. Many are known to have been alive on the ground following their shoot downs. Although the Pathet Lao publicly stated on several occasions that they held "tens of tens" of American prisoners, not one American held in Laos has ever been released. Laos did not participate in the Paris Peace accords ending American involvment in the war in 1973, and no treaty has ever been signed that would free the Americans held in Laos, and not one of them has returned home.
William Mason was a 1946 graduate of West Point. Thomas Mitchell was a 1963 graduate of the Air Force Academy.
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Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2003 19:25:05 -0700 From: (Chris Chambers)
There is some information incorrect in this posting. LTC, then Major Chambers was the passanger. LTC. Jerry L Chambers was a FAC assigned to the 23rd TASS at NAKOM PHANOM. During this flight he ws present as an observer.
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| September 21, 2009
Crash site yields
evidence of Mountain Home airman's fate The discovery and excavation of a Vietnam-era USAF C-130 crash site in Laos has yielded the remains of five known crewmates of USAF Chief Master Sgt. Thomas E. Knebel of Mountain Home and some peace of mind for the fallen sergeant's mother and two sisters. Sgt. Knebel's mother, Randi Knebel, 83, recently received two large bound volumes from the Department of Defense's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command containing written and photographic documents that show and describe work at the crash site. Although no human remains were found to positively identify Sgt. Knebel and three other crewmates believed among the dead, the crash site and a single marble taken from it are the clearest evidence yet of Sgt. Knebel's likely fate on May 22, 1968. That and the promise of a memorial service honoring the plane's crew in Washington, D.C., next year is enough to give Mrs. Knebel a sense of resolution regarding the son she has missed for more than 40 years. "I never believed he was dead," Mrs. Knebel said. "I always expected him to walk in the door someday." Sgt. Knebel's sister, Mona, was in the fifth grade in 1968 when an USAF car rolled up to the Knebel home and truck farm near Lakeview. The news that Thomas was missing in action was difficult for the sergeant's father, the late Leo Knebel, who died in 1993. "Mom was at work at the lab (Baxter Healthcare). I remember Dad asked them if they would come back and tell mother because he didn't think he could," Mona said. That day began long, difficult days for the Knebels — days that turned into weeks and months and years with no word about Tommy. "I saw mom's heart broken over and over again as POWs came home and Tommy wasn't with them," Mona said. Sister Carol Eberhardt was a high school junior when news of her brother's MIA status came. She says she had been relatively certain for years that her brother was dead. Thursday she said she had hoped for clear evidence that her brother had been on the plane. The single marble was an important find, she said. As a boy, Tommy Knebel enjoyed marbles. Mona said he played with marbles and carried them like many boys did in the 1950s and '60s, and his affinity for marbles continued as he became an airman. Mona said she was still at an age to romp and play and ride on her big brother's back when he came home on leave from the Air Force. She recalled that the 20-year-old sergeant carried marbles in his pockets when he was home at leave for Christmas, 1967. Losing a brother at such a young age to a war that Carol would not discuss on Thursday has created some lingering philosophical issues for the elder sister. "When I look back on it, it seemed like Tommy was so old," Carol said. "He was 20." "I wonder how many young people's lives were cut short; the brilliant young people we lost and what they might have become?" Carol asks. "He loved airplanes. He could have been a pilot. Maybe he could have landed that plane on the Hudson and saved all those passengers." Since the conclusion of the excavation and subsequent news stories, Mona and her mother have received correspondence from strangers that has touched them in ways they did not anticipate. Soon after the first news accounts of the investigation's findings were published, Mrs. Knebel received a letter from Liz Barone of Sherwood, the wife of a C-130 pilot. "Thanks for your bravery, service and sacrifice of your son, Thomas," Barone wrote. "I will never begin to fully understand the depth of your loss. As a mother and wife of a C-130 pilot who has just returned from Afganistan, I hope and pray this in some way brings you peace." In a letter to Mona, retired USAF Msgt. William Bradley of Little Rock writes: "I have worn an MIA bracelet for a lot of years with your brother's name on it: CMS Thomas E. Knebel. "I did not know your brother, but I was stationed in Okinawa at the time in a C-130 Hercules wing. My hope is this will let his family find closure. May God rest his soul. "Please find enclosed the MIA bracelet. "We know where he is now." Signed: William G. Bradley. Said Mona: "America is full of good people of kindred spirit. It means a lot."
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