| Date: 11 August 1965 |
| Aircraft type: A-4E Skyhawk |
| Serial Number: 151185 |
| Military Unit: VA-23 |
| Service: USN |
| Home Base: USS Midway |
| Name(s): |
| Lt(jg) Donald Hubert Brown (KIA) |
| Following the loss of the first US aircraft to the SA-2 on 24 July and the subsequent disastrous raid on the SAM sites three days later, there had been no further SAM activity apart from new construction of sites. On the night of 11/12 August two A-4s flown by Lt(jg) D H Brown and Lt Cdr F D Roberge were flying at 9,000 feet on a road reconnaissance mission about 30 miles northwest of Thanh Hoa when they spotted what they initially thought were two flares glowing beneath a cloud layer below them. Too late they realized that the ‘flares’ were in fact the exhaust plumes from two SA-2 missiles. Lt Brown’s aircraft (call sign Law Case 345) was hit and exploded and Lt Cdr Roberge’s aircraft was badly damaged but managed to limp back to the Midway where it was discovered to have more than 50 shrapnel holes from the missile’s explosion. The day after this incident, the US Navy mounted the first sorties of its SAM suppression campaign. Almost exactly 20 years to the day after his death, the remains of Donald Brown were handed over to the US authorities on 14 August 1985. |
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