I had a buddy from OCS, The Basic School, Pensacola Flight School, Mike Shea, who died flying a CH-46 helo during the Vietnam pull-out in 1975.Sad.
Yeah, it was. Mike left a wife and at least one child. We were in the same platoon at The Basic School and “due to the water”, 6 of our wives all had kids in the same month after we got to Flight School. :-)
The Twilight Zone end of the story happened years later on a visit to Washington, DC. I took my wife to see The Wall. A POW/MIA group was handing out literature and selling the Bracelet. I stopped to buy a Bracelet. The first one I picked up was for “1stLt Mike Shea, USMC. MIA”.
Naturally, that was the one I bought.
Small world!