TERRELL, IRBY DAVID

Name: Irby David Terrell
Rank/Branch: O4/United States Air Force, NAV
Unit: 41st TEWS
Date of Birth: 10 November 1933
Home City of Record: Houston TX
Date of Loss: 14 January 1968
Country of Loss: North Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 193300 North 1043300 East
Status (in 1973): Returnee
Category:
Missions: 9
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: EB66C

Other Personnel in Incident: Pilot, Sonnie Mercer, escaped/evaded/rescued
but died from injuries; INST NAV, Pete Pedroli, escaped/evaded/rescued;
EWO Thomas Sumpter, returnee; EWO Ronald Lebert, returnee; EWO Hubert
Walker, returnee; EWO Lt. Thompson, escaped/evaded/rescued.

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.

REMARKS: 730314 RELEASED BY DRV

SOURCE: WE CAME HOME copyright 1977
Captain and Mrs. Frederic A Wyatt (USNR Ret), Barbara Powers Wyatt, Editor
P.O.W. Publications, 10250 Moorpark St., Toluca Lake, CA 91602
Text is reproduced as found in the original publication (including date and
spelling errors).
UPDATE - 09/95 by the P.O.W. NETWORK, Skidmore, MO

IRBY DAVID TERRELL, JR.
Lieutenant Colonel - United States Air Force
Shot Down: January 14, 1968
Released: March 14, 1973

I am a native Virginian born 10 November 1933. I attended King College,
Bristol, Tennessee, before enlisting in the Air Force in March 1953. I
completed Aviation Cadet Training and was commissioned on 30 June 1954.

I served in the Air Defense Command at Dover, Delaware as a Radar Intercept
Officer in the F-94C interceptor. Then I attended Bomb/Nav upgrading at
Sacramento, California. My next eight years were spent in the Strategic Air
Command at Roswell, New Mexico and Columbus, Mississippi as a B-52 Bombadier/
Navigator. Under "Operation Bootstrap," I graduated from the University of
Omaha in 1965. I then spent four months on Guam in 1965-66 flying 31 B-52
missions over South Vietnam.

In June 1967 I completed 10 months in the Education with Industry Program with
the Boeing Company in Seattle, Washington. After attending EB-66 crew training
at Sumpter, South Carolina, I arrived at Takhli Air Base, Thailand in December
1967. While flying as an EB-66C navigator on my 9th mission, I was shot down
by a Mig, 80 miles southwest of Hanoi on 14 January 1968. I was captured on 16
January 1968, and I was released on 14 March 1973.

I have two children, Jenny and David. I will remain on active duty in the
Air Force.

My personal message: During over five years in captivity, one idea has
dominated my thinking: How fortunate I am to be an American! I have seen the
other side. I have had every real and imagined fault of the United States of
America pointed out to me time and lime again by my captors. But, I have
returned with a stronger conviction that although we are far from perfect, our
system excels over any other on earth, and that our basic ideals and
principles are honorable and just. I have faith that we will continue to work
for a peaceful world and freedom while firmly resisting those who would
enslave mankind.

December 1996
Irby Terrell retired from the United States Air Force as a Colonel. He and
his wife Charlene reside in Georgia.

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