HOLP EARL S

CPT Earl S Holp was a potential VHPA member who died after his tour in Vietnam on 11/02/1973 at the age of 28.2
Flight Class 67-22
Date of Birth 08/26/1945
Served in the U.S. Army
Served in Vietnam with 114 AHC in 71, 335 AHC in 71
This information was provided by Frank Root, 114th ASSOCAITION

More detail on this person: Captain Holp was a "Falcon" with the 335th AHC in 1971 also. I was a crew chief on my second separate tour with the 335th when I served as a crew member of his. The most significant memory of him I have is of a mission where we had some down time at a lesser used, but once more important staging airfield called Tra Vinh in the Mekong Delta. We (the crew, both pilots and EM) got into the only discussion I recall as to why we thought we were here in Vietnam. No pilot had ever opened this type of discussion to me prior to this.

I remember that the other pilot was Captain John Zylka and have no memory who my gunner was. It was my second tour with the 335th and we were extremely RLO heavy in the Falcon gun platoon, with seemingly far more RLO's than WO's or CWO's.

I actually have pictures of the very day of my memory. It was probably the only time that we had been back to this airfield during my second tour and it was not in conjunction with a combat assault operation with slicks and guns. We were escorting and protecting a Chinook that was relocating an obscure isolated outpost from an area that got too hot to manage or control.

From: Frank Root

This information was last updated 05/18/2016

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Date posted on this site: 01/11/2025