| Date: 18 July 1965 |
| Aircraft type: A-6A Intruder |
| Serial Number: 151577 |
| Military Unit: VA-75 |
| Service: USN |
| Home Base: USS Independence |
| Name(s): |
| Cdr Jeremiah Andrew Denton, Jr. (POW) |
| Lt(jg) William Michael Tschudy (POW) |
| Just four days after the loss of the first Intruder in combat, the Independence suffered another loss, this time with its crew. The aircraft was part of a formation attacking the Ham Rong port facilities near the Dragon’s Jaw Bridge at Thanh Hoa. The loss of 151577 was almost a carbon copy of the loss of the first aircraft. Just after releasing the Mk82 bombs the crew felt a detonation and the aircraft (call sign Flying Ace 500) began to lose hydraulic and electrical power. Throttle control was also lost and the crew were forced to eject near the target to face the next eight years as POWs.
Denton and Tschudy had flown 12 and 13 missions respectively over Vietnam before they were shot down. Cdr Denton was the Air Wing’s operations officer and had been due to assume command of VA-75 on 20 July. They were both released on 12 February 1973. Jeremiah Denton eventually retired from the Navy as a Rear Admiral and went on to be elected to the US Senate as a Democrat for Alabama in 1980. He wrote an account of his POW experiences titled When Hell was in Session which was published in 1976 and which served as the basis for a television film. |
You may return to your search results, go to the Search Form, or go back to the Home Page.