Information on U.S. Army helicopter UH-1B tail number 62-01961
Date: 03/09/1964
Incident number: 07839ACD Accident case number: 07839 Total Loss Accident
Unit: 114 AVN
South Vietnam
Number killed in accident = 2 . . Injured = 2 . . Passengers = 0
costing 193648
Original source(s) and document(s) from which the incident was created or updated: Defense
Intelligence Agency Helicopter Loss database. Army Aviation Safety Center database. Also: OPERA,
Spring 2002 114 Newsletter, DD Form 1300 (Operations Report. )
Summary: While in a tactical orbit, crashed in the river immediately sinking in 60 feet of water drowning the Crew Chief and Gunner.
Loss to Inventory
Crew Members:
P CPT GREELEY IRA E
CP CW3 DANIEL CORNELIUS
CE SP5 WRIGHT WYLEY JR KIA
G PFC SHEA JOHN FRANCIS KIA
War Story:
The following is from the 114th Avn. Co history book, "Knights over the Delta", by Steve Stibbens, editor:
Comments by George Young, CO of the 114th Avn Co.:
They talk about the loneliness of command. Only time I got lonely was when I had to write those letters of condolence. The rest of the time, I was surrounded by people. Things came up. But they were always resolved.
My first casualty was hard. They all are but I had awfully mixed feelings about the first one. I was a tragedy. It involved the Defense Secretary McNamara and General Maxwell Taylor. Of course, I couldn't tell people like McNamara and Taylor were they could go. I had personal feelings that we had no business being out there in that area that day. But we were there.
We got the mission and we flew the mission. I had been in command about five days on March 9, 1964 and it was still the old company and they had not had a casualty, except for Carl Ballard, who was killed accidentally on the runway a year earlier. They had done these VIP flights hundreds of times and were just following orders. Unofficially, later on when some analyzing took place, the man flying that ship was kind of green. Even though he had been there and was getting short, he was kind of 'hot-rodding' it.
It was determined that his turn was too steep. He pulled too many Gs and it just got away from him. What made it really bad was that these two people in back [SP5 Wylie Wright, PFC John Shea] were tied in by their 'monkey straps' so they could stand out on the skids. They just couldn't get un-strapped when the aircraft went down and they drowned in the river. You know, we never came up with anything better than that 'monkey strap.'
That was my first next-of-kin letter. It really hurt to write those letters but I did them. Wrote them out in longhand then the clerk typed them up and I signed them. That's something that never changes. When you lose somebody like that, it's always the same heartbreak. I always wrote the next-of-kin letter.
Above source: http://www.honoredmps.org/ which is no longer available.
According to an article written by John Jones in the Spring 2002 The Knight Letter, this aircraft was lost as a result of a mechanical failure and crashed while providing escort for an inspection tour of the Delta by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. The article also states that Wylie Wright designed the units first Cobra Gun Platoon patch.
Lacking the incident data. I will relate what was told of this incident to Vinh Long personnel in Jan 66. This aircraft went down in the Mekong River outside of Sadec. From: Charles Klotz
Editor's note: Above are three versions of what may have caused this accident: 1. Pilot lost control in an unnecessary steep turn (described as a tactical orbit on his DD Form 1300). 2. Mechanical failure. 3. Loss of power. The surviving pilots are now deceased as are George Young and any known witnesses.
This record was last updated on 03/17/2021
This information is available on CD-ROM.
Additional information is available on KIAs at http://www.coffeltdatabase.org
Please send additions or corrections to: The VHPA Webmaster Gary Roush.
KIA statistics
Return to the KIA panel date index
Date posted on this site: 08/17/2025
Copyright © 1998 - 2025 Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association