CPT CHARLES RONALD BARNES

 

04 Aug 2006 You shall be remembered, Captain Barnes. You had a passenger aboard that day who was a classmate of mine, Raymond Bobe. You probably didn't know it, but you were in the BEST of company when in the company of Raymond. I am sure your sister, Mary, thinks of you every day. As I take time to remember Raymond, I will remember you along side him. I have read the report published by the Webmaster and am thankful for the information even though all who lost family and friends on that flight are saddened. It took 36 years to get the remains that could be found home. On that fateful day, you all were in the presence of Angels. I am sure we will find you just iside the gates of Heaven, waiting patiently for us. You and Raymond have remained forever young in our hearts and minds and we long for the peace you have had for 37 years. From a friend of a classmate who was on your last flight, Reba Darnell nooboocoo@charter.net

 

A Note from The Virtual Wall On 16 March 1969 the Command Aviation Company, 210th Aviation Battalion, was tasked with flying a routine logistics mission which originated at Long Thanh with several scheduled stops enroute Hue/Phu Bai and return. The aircraft assigned was a UC-21A aircraft (tail number 66-18007). The trip was uneventful through its first scheduled stops. At Long Binh passengers Major Marvin L. Foster, SP4 Michael Batt, and PFC Raymond Bobe boarded the aircraft for transportation to Hue. The aircraft went from Long Binh to Qui Nhon, where two passengers deplaned, and departed for Hue/Phu Bai. The flight to Hue was conducted under instrument conditions with the UC-21A flying in clouds at 8,000 feet at the time contact was established with Danang Approach Control. The aircraft was handed off to Phu Bai GCA control when it was about 10 miles east of the airport heading 220 degrees and level at 2,000 feet. The controllers vectored the UC-21A for an instrument approach to touchdown but lost contact after the aircraft requested a turn out to sea for terrain clearance. Search and rescue efforts had to await improvement in the weather and were unsuccessful in finding any evidence of the aircraft or its crew and passengers. The five men aboard were classed as "Missing" and were continued in that category until the Secretary of the Army approved Presumptive Findings of Death on the dates shown below: Aircrew, Cmd Avn Co, 210th Avn Bn, 12th Avn Grp, 1 Avn Bde CPT Charles R. Barnes, Fullerton, PA (08/24/1976) CPT David R. Smith, Dayton, OH (10/15/1973) B Co, 36th Eng Bn, 34th Eng Grp, 20th Eng Bde LTC Marvin L. Foster, Hubbard, TX (10/10/1978) HQ Company, US Army Vietnam SSG Michael L. Batt, Defiance, OH (08/31/1978) SFC Raymond E. Bobe, Tarrant, AL (11/06/1978) Nothing further was known until the following press release was issued: NEWS RELEASE from the United States Department of Defense No. 720-05 IMMEDIATE RELEASE Jul 15, 2005 Army Soldiers MIA from Vietnam War are Identified The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of four U.S. servicemen, missing in action from the Vietnam War, have been identified and are being returned to their families for burial. They are Lt. Col. Marvin L. Foster, Hubbard, Tex.; Capt. David R. Smith, Dayton, Ohio; Sgt. 1st Class Michael L. Batt, Defiance, Ohio; and Sgt. 1st Class Raymond E. Bobe, Tarrant, Ala., all U.S. Army. On March 16, 1969, Capt. Smith was piloting an Army U-21A "Ute" aircraft with Foster, Batt, Bobe and one other passenger aboard whose remains have not been identified. The aircraft left Qui Nhon airfield in South Vietnam, headed for Phu Bai airport near Hue. The Da Nang control tower briefly established radar and radio contact, but was unable to maintain it. The aircraft never landed at the Phu Bai airport. Combat search and rescue units scoured the area, both land and sea, for the next eight days, but did not find the missing aircraft. In 1988 and 1989, the Vietnamese government turned over to U.S. specialists several boxes of human remains, including identification tags for Bobe and Smith. The technology of the time failed to yield an identification of the remains. Also in 1989, a Vietnamese refugee in the Philippines was interviewed, and turned over human remains as well as a rubbing of an identification tag for Bobe. U.S. specialists from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) conducted seven investigations between 1993 and 1999, to include interviews with Vietnamese nationals who claimed to have knowledge of the crash. Then in April and May of 2000, a JPAC team excavated an area about 25 miles northwest of Da Nang, where they found aircraft debris and human remains. JPAC scientists and Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory specialists used mitochondrial DNA as one of the forensic tools to help identify the remains. The press release does not mention Captain Charles R. Barnes by name; he is the "one other passenger aboard whose remains have not been identified".

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