Air Force Pilot Missing From Vietnam War Is Identified

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NEWS RELEASES from the United States Department of Defense
No. 1007-07 IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 15, 2007
Media Contact: (703) 697-5131/697-5132
Public/Industry(703) 428-0711

Air Force Pilot Missing From Vietnam War Is Identified

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO)
announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from
the Vietnam War, have been identified and will be returned to his family
for burial with full military honors.

He is Lt. Col. Alton C. Rockett, Jr., U.S. Air Force, of Birmingham,
Ala.He will be buried Monday in Arlington National Cemetery near
Washington, D.C.

On June 2, 1967, Rockett and his co-pilot, Capt. Daniel L. Carrier,
crewed the number two aircraft in a flight of two F-4Cs flying an armed
reconnaissance mission over Quang Binh Province, North Vietnam.During
their bomb run, anti-aircraft ground fire was observed, but Rockett
reported that his aircraft was not hit.When the lead aircraft completed its
bomb run, the flight leader told Rockett to return to base, but moments
later, he saw a large fireball in his rear-view mirror.He made several
radio calls to Rockett, but did not hear or see anything from the
aircraft.Due to the dangerous location, there were no further search and
rescue attempts.

In June and July 1989, Vietnamese officials repatriated to the United
States sets of remains of U.S. servicemembers.The officials also
supplied documents identifying that three of the sets of remains were those

of Rockett, Carrier and another serviceman, Col. Samuel C. Maxwell.It
was later discovered that the name associations among those remains had
been confused.In October and November 1989, Maxwell and Carrier were
identified after further analysis, but the third set of remains could not
be attributed to Rockett at that time.

In 1993, a joint U.S./Socialist Republic of Vietnam (S.R.V.) team, led
by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), investigated the
incident and interviewed witnesses.One Vietnamese citizen said that Rockett

and Carrier were buried near the crash site, but that their remains
were exhumed in 1978 by Vietnamese officials.
In 2001, another joint U.S./S.R.V. team re-interviewed witnesses and
surveyed the burial and crash sites.Small pieces of airplane wreckage
were found at the crash site.

In 2003, a maternal-line mitochondrial DNA reference sample for Rockett
was obtained. In 2006, another joint U.S./S.R.V. team excavated the burial sites, but recovered no human remains.

Using forensic identification tools, circumstantial evidence and
mitochondrial DNA, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA
Identification Laboratory identified Rockett's remains, which were those
previously repatriated to the United States in 1989.

For additional information of the Defense Department's mission to
account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at www.dtic.mil/dpmo
or call (703) 699-1420.