KULLAND, BYRON KENT
Remains identified 04/02/94
The markings on the Wall were changed from a cross to a star April 30, 1994
Name: Byron Kent Kulland
Rank/Branch: O2/US Army
Unit: F Troop, 8th Cavalry, 196th Infantry Brigade
Date of Birth: 09 November 1947 (Stanley ND)
Home City of Record: New Town ND
Date of Loss: 02 April 1972
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 165022N 1070455E (YD218628)
Status (in 1973): Missing In Action
Category: 1
Acft/Vehicle/Ground: UH1H
Refno: 1812
Personnel in Incident: April 2: Robin F. Gatwood; Wayne L. Bolte; Anthony
Giannangeli; Charles A. Levis; Henry M. Serex; (all missing from the EB66).
LtCol. Iceal Hambleton (rescued after 12 days from EB66).
Ronald P. Paschall; Byron K. Kulland; John W. Frink (all missing from UH1H
rescue helicopter), Jose M. Astorga (captured and released in 1973 from
UH1H).
April 3: William J. Henderson (captured and released in 1973 from OV10A
rescue craft); Mark Clark (rescued after 12 days from OV10A rescue craft).
April 6: James H. Alley; Allen J. Avery; Peter H. Chapman; John H. Call;
William R. Pearson; Roy D. Prater (all KIA/BNR from HH53C "Jolly 52" rescue
chopper). Also in very close proximity to "Bat 21"on April 3: Allen D.
Christensen; Douglas L. O'Neil; Edward W. Williams; Larry A. Zich (all
missing from UH1H). April 7: Bruce Charles Walker (evaded 11 days); Larry
F. Potts (captured & died in POW camp) (both missing from OV10A).
REMARKS:
SYNOPSIS: On the afternoon of April 2, 1972, two Thailand-based EB66
aircraft (Bat 21 and Bat 22), from the 30th Air Division, were flying
pathfinder escort for a cell of B52s bombing near the DMZ. Bat 21 took a
direct SAM hit and the plane went down. A single beeper signal was heard,
that of navigator Col. Iceal Hambleton. At this time it was assumed the rest
of the crew died in the crash. The crew included Maj. Wayne L. Bolte, pilot;
1Lt. Robin F. Gatwood, LtCol. Anthony R. Giannangeli, LtCol. Charles A.
Levis, and Maj. Henry M. Serex, all crew members. It should be noted that
the lowest ranking man aboard this plane was Gatwood, a First Lieutenant.
This was not an ordinary crew, and its members, particularly Hambleton,
would be a prize capture for the enemy because of military knowledge they
possessed.
It became critical, therefore, that the U.S. locate Hambleton, and any other
surviving crew members before the Vietnamese did - and the Vietnamese were
trying hard to find them first.
An Army search and rescue team was nearby and dispatched two UH1H "slicks"
and two UH1B "Cobras". When they approached Hambleton's position just before
dark, at about 50 feet off the ground, with one of the AH1G Cobra gunships
flying at 300 feet for cover, two of the helicopters were shot down. One,
the Cobra (Blue Ghost 28) reached safety and the crew was picked up, without
having seen the other downed helicopter. The other, a UH1H from F Troop, 8th
Cavalry, 196th Brigade, had just flown over some huts into a clearing when
they encountered ground fire, and the helicopter exploded. Jose Astorga, the
gunner, was injured in the chest and knee by the gunfire. Astorga became
unconscious, and when he recovered, the helicopter was on the ground. He
found the pilot, 1Lt. Byron K. Kulland, lying outside the helicopter. WO
John W. Frink, the co-pilot, was strapped in his seat and conscious. The
crew chief, SP5 Ronald P. Paschall, was pinned by his leg in the helicopter,
but alive. WO Franks urged Astorga to leave them, and Astorga was captured.
He soon observed the aircraft to be hit by automatic weapons fire, and to
explode with the rest of the crew inside. He never saw the rest of the crew
again. Astorga was relesed by the North Vietnamese in 1973.
The following day, Nail 38, an OV10A equipped with electronic rescue gear
enabling its crew to get a rapid "fix" on its rescue target entered
Hambleton's area and was shot down. The crew, William J. Henderson and Mark
Clark, both parachuted out safely. Henderson was captured and released in
1973. Clark evaded for 12 days and was subsequently rescued.
On April 3, the day Nail 38 was shot down, a UH1H "slick" went down in the
same area carrying a crew of four enlisted Army personnel. They had no
direct connection to the rescue of Bat 21, but were very probably shot down
by the same SAM installations that downed Bat 21. The helicopter, from H/HQ,
37th Signal Battalion, 1st Signal Brigade, had left Marble Mountain
Airfield, Da Nang, on a standard resupply mission to signal units in and
around Quang Tri City. The crew, consisting of WO Douglas L. O'Neil, pilot;
CW2 Larry A. Zich, co-pilot; SP5 Allen D. Christensen, crew chief; and SP4
Edward W. Williams, gunner; remain missing in action.
On April 6, an attempt was made to pick up Clark and Hambleton which
resulted in an HH53C helicopter being shot down. The chopper was badly hit.
The helicopter landed on its side and continued to burn, consuming the
entire craft, and presumably, all 6 men aboard. The crew of this aircraft
consisted of James H. Alley; Allen J. Avery, John H. Call III, Peter H.
Chapman, William R. Pearson, and Roy D. Prater. Search and rescue noted no
signs of survivors, but it is felt that the Vientamese probably know the
fate of this crew because of the close proximity of the downed aircraft to
enemy locations.
On April 7 another Air Force OV10A went down in the area with Larry Potts
and Bruce Walker aboard. Walker, the Air Force pilot of the aircraft, evaded
capture 11 days, while it is reported that Potts was captured and died in
Quang Binh prison. Potts, the observer, was a Marine Corps officer. Walker's
last radio transmission to search and rescue was for SAR not to make an
attempt to rescue, the enemy was closing in. Both men remain unaccounted
for.
Hambleton and Clark were rescued after 12 incredible days. Hambleton
continually changed positions and reported on enemy activity as he went,
even to the extent of calling in close air strikes near his position. He was
tracked by a code he devised relating to the length and lie direction of
various golf holes he knew well. Another 20 or so Americans were not so
fortunate.
In July 1986, the daughter of Henry Serex learned that, one week after all
search and rescue had been "called off" for Bat 21, another mission was
mounted to recover "another downed crewmember" from Bat 21. She doesn't know
whether or not it is her father or another man on the EB66 aircraft. No
additional information has been released. When the movie "Bat 21" was
released, she was horrified to learn that virtually no mention of the rest
of the crew, including her father, was made.
In Vietnam, to most fighting men, the man that fought beside them, whether
in the air or on the ground, was worth dying for. Each understood that the
other would die for him if necessary. Thus, also considering the critical
knowledge possessed by Col. Hambleton and some of the others, the seemingly
uncanny means taken to recover Clark and Hambleton are not so unusual at
all.
What defies logic and explaination, however, is that the government that
sent these men to battle can distort or withold information to their
families, and knowingly abandon hundreds of men known or strongly suspected
to be in enemy hands.
Thousands of reports have been received by the U.S. Government indicating
that Americans are still alive, in captivity in Southeast Asia. It has been
17 years for those who may have survived the 1972 Easter crashes and rescue
attempts. How much longer must they wait for their country to bring "peace
with honor" to them and bring them home?
------------------------------
[her0502.94 05/03/94]
Herald
Washington State
Robin Stanton
Family ends a quest
22 years later, Vietnam hero from Lynnwood is
finally laid to rest
Ronald Paschall looks out from the poster-sized photo in his father's
study.
His dark hair is a little shaggy. He's sitting down, relaxed, a barbed
wire fence a blur in the backround. His mouth is slightly parted, as if
her were about to speak.
But the lively young man in the picture has been dead for 22 years, his
helicopter shot down on Easter Sunday 1972 in Vietnam. And after years
of wondering and waiting, his father and his sister finally laid him to
rest in the Arlington national Cemetery on Saturday.
His mother, Ruth, died in January of 1993, without ever knowing her
son's fate.
"It was always on her mind," Marvin Paschall said. "We'd be sitting here
just talking, and she'd say, 'I wonder,...'"
They'd believed for a long time that Ron was dead, he said.
The crash occurred just six days before he was to return home. He sent a
letter to his girlfriend in Edmonds that day, saying he'd be home in a
week. The same day she got the letter, Army officers visited his parents
to say he'd disappeared.
"They say the helicopter crashed, but didn't catch fire," Paschall said.
"We thought he was a priosoner, and he'd come home when the war was
over."
But the war ended and Ron didn't come home.
Later, the Paschalls heard from the door gunner who had ridden with Ron
when he crashed.
"He sat right here and told us, word for word, what happened," Paschall
said. "He said Ron was out of the helicopter, but another guy was stuck
inside. Ron went back in after him, and the enemy started firing at the
helicopter. It went up in a ball of fire. The door gunner said it was so
hot it took his breath away."
The Army called Mr. Paschall a few months ago to say they had found his
son's remains. Army officials stayed in close touch with the family ,
and an officer flew out to meet with Paschall and his daughter, Janet
Peyton, to discuss how they were able to identify the remains. They made
plans for the funeral service for Ron Paschall and two other soldiers
who died with him.
Mr. Paschall and Janet and David Peyton flew to Washington, DC, Thursday
night. Army officials met them and put them up at the Executive Suites
Inn in Arlington, VA.
The funeral service was held Saturday.
"That church was packed full," Marvin Paschall said. "After it was over,
we came outside and there was a band playing over here and another band
playing on the other side. They set their caskets on a big wagon, pulled
by six white horses.
"We came right behind them, then an honor guard carrying their guns, and
the band followed."
After the bodies were interred, the honor guard fired a 21-gun salute,
he said.
At the funeral, they met the families of the other young men who had
been killed, and men, now older, who served with Ron Paschall in
Vietnam.
"One of them told me he remembered playing with my brother, " Janet
Peyton said. "They'd pretend they were like kids again, and they'd play
on the roofs of the Quonset huts, tossing pop cans filled with rocks at
each other."
"They really were just kids," her husband, David Peyton, said.
Seeing his friends grown older, with hairlines starting to recede, left
Janet Peyton with questions, "I wonder what he'd be like now."
Marvin Paschall fingered the tracing he'd made of his son's name on the
wall, the memorial to the dead of the Vietnam War. Ron's medals covered
the small dining room table in the red wood-frame house he grew up in.
"Here's the Purple Heart. You know that one," Paschall said. "This one
is a special medal, made for those who were missing in the war. Here's a
Bronze Star."
Paschall misses his wife, his sweetheart for 49 years. But he said it
would have been hard for her to go through these last months.
"I wouldn't want her to know that her son laid out in the jungle for 22
years, under the hot sun," he said. "She loved her children so very
much."
Everyone wants to know how he feels now that his long wait is over, he
said. "It's hard to say, afer you have waited and waited for so long,"
he said.
He paused for a moment.
"I'd a damn sight rather have it be this way than for him to have been a
prisoner all these years. It's a relief to really know that he wasn't a
prisoner, that he has been found, and to really know what happened."
[distributed through the P.O.W. NETWORK]
[ssrep7.txt 02/09/93]
South Vietnam Ronald P. Paschall
Byron K. Kulland
John W. Frink
(1812)
On April 2, 1972, a UH-1H helicopter from the 1st Signal Brigade
with four men on-board was on a direct combat support mission near
Quang Tri City, Quang Tri Province. While searching for the crew
of a downed U.S. Air Force aircraft, the helicopter was hit by
hostile small arms fire and crashed. An airborne SAR mission
failed to locate any survivors and the crew was declared missing in
action.
In April 1972, a former People's Army of Vietnam sergeant reported
the downing of a helicopter on April 1, 1972, which crashed near an
anti-aircraft gun position in the vicinity of this loss incident.
The crew was believed to have been killed in the crash. In another
report, a former People's Army soldier reported sighting an
American POW in April 1972 who was being escorted by nurses near
the Ben Hai River in Quang Tri Province. The American was captured
from an aircraft shot down by People's Army forces.
In March 1973, surviving crewman Jose M. Astorga was repatriated
alive during Operation Homecoming. He reported that hostile fire
hit their helicopter's fuel cell which exploded, engulfing their
helicopter in flames. He believed all other crewmen died in the
ensuing fire and crash, and neither he nor any other returning POWs
had any knowledge that any other crewmen survived into captivity.
After Operation Homecoming, the other crewmen were declared killed
in action, body not recovered based on a presumptive finding of
death.
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