| Date: 11 February 1969 |
| Aircraft type: F-105D Thunderchief |
| Serial Number: 62-4256 |
| Military Unit: 34 TFS, 388 TFW |
| Service: USAF |
| Home Base: Korat temporarily operating from Takhli |
| Name(s): |
| 1Lt Robert John Zukowski (KIA) |
| North Vietnamese trucks travelling along the Trail required large amounts of fuel and oil that had to be stored in concealed dumps at regular intervals. Whenever these POL storage sites were found they became prime targets. A flight of two F-105s was despatched to attack a POL store near Ban Topen, 15 miles southwest of the Ban Karai Pass. 1Lt Zukowski put his aircraft (call sign Speedo) into a 45-degree dive over the target but as he passed through 5,000 feet the Thunderchief rolled inverted and continued its dive straight into the ground. 1Lt Zukowski was not seen to eject and was posted as missing in action. His status was changed to killed in action on 15 January 1979. Robert Zukowski had arrived at Korat on 12 June 1968 and had flown 122 missions in Southeast Asia before being killed. During three joint field investigations by US and Laotian personnel in 1993 and 1996, human remains and personal items including identity tags, a watch and a St Christopher medallion, were found at the crash site and formally identified on 30 October 1996 as being those of Robert Zukowski. The watch was one of four that 1Lt Zukowski had purchased and had had engraved for his father, his brothers and himself. The watch, along with one of the identity tags, was placed in his coffin when he was buried at Justice, Illinois. |
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