| Date: 5 August 1964 |
| Aircraft type: A-1H Skyraider |
| Serial Number: 139760 |
| Military Unit: VA-145 |
| Service: USN |
| Home Base: USS Constellation |
| Name(s): |
| Lt(jg) Richard Christian Sather (KIA) |
| Aircraft type: A-4C Skyhawk |
| Serial Number: 149578 |
| Military Unit: VA-144 |
| Service: USN |
| Home Base: USS Constellation |
| Name(s): |
| Lt(jg) Everett Alvarez, Jr. (POW) |
| Operation Pierce Arrow commenced in the early afternoon of 5 August with 20 aircraft from USS Constellation (10 Skyraiders, eight Skyhawks and two Phantoms) attacking the torpedo boat base at Hon Gay while 12 more (five Skyhawks, four Skyraiders and three Phantoms) from the same carrier struck the Loc Chao base. Simultaneously, the USS Ticonderoga sent six F-8s to the torpedo boat bases at Quang Khe and Ben Thuy and 26 other aircraft to bomb an oil storage depot at Vinh. Unfortunately, President Johnson’s premature television announcement that the raids were to take place may have warned the North Vietnamese who put up a fierce barrage of anti-aircraft fire at all the targets resulting in the loss of two aircraft. Lt Sather’s Skyraider (or Spad as it was nicknamed by both Navy and Air Force pilots) (call sign Electron) was hit by AAA while on its third dive bomb attack and crashed just offshore from Thanh Hoa. No parachute was seen or radio emergency beeper heard and it was assumed that Sather died in the crash, the first naval airman to be killed in the war. The North Vietnamese eventually repatriated his body in August 1985.
Having taken part in the abortive hunt for North Vietnamese torpedo boats during the night, Lt Alvarez also took part in the Pierce Arrow attack on torpedo boats at Hon Gay. He was forced to eject at low level when his Skyhawk (call sign War Paint 411) flew into a barrage of AAA during the attack. Alvarez was captured and became the first airman to become a prisoner of the North Vietnamese (as opposed to Capt F J Thompson captured on 26 March who was a US Army observer shot down in a USAF aircraft). Everett Alvarez, who was on his first tour since graduating as a pilot in 1961, spent eight and a half years in various North Vietnamese prisons before being released in Operation Homecoming on 12 February 1973. He was known to other POWs as the Old Man of the North due to his longevity in the POW camps. Alvarez retired as a Commander in 1980 and went to law school and later became the Deputy Administrator of the Veterans Administration under the Reagan presidency. Results claimed for Operation Pierce Arrow included the destruction of 90 per cent of the petroleum storage facility at Vinh together with the destruction or damage of an estimated 25 torpedo boats, representing two-thirds of the North Vietnamese force. |
You may return to your search results, go to the Search Form, or go back to the Home Page.