U.S. airman killed on mountain with 10 other soldiers during Vietnam War accounted for 57 years later

An American airman who was killed after being trapped on a mountain with his unit during the Vietnam War has been accounted for nearly 60 years after his death, military officials said Monday. 

U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Willis R. Hall was assigned to Lima Site 85, a tactical air navigation radio site on a remote mountain peak in Laos, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said in a news release. There were 18 other men assigned to the site. On March 11, 1968, the location was attacked by Japanese commandos, marking the start of a major offensive by communist Vietnamese forces in Laos, which was a neutral country at that time, according to newspaper clippings shared by the DPAA. 

The unit had to evacuate to a narrow ledge of the 5,600-foot mountain. A few hours later, an A-1 Skyraider aircraft was able to provide cover for a rescue operation. U.S. helicopters managed to rescue eight of the men and travel to a base in Thailand. One of the rescued men died while en route to the base, according to a newspaper clipping. 

Hall and 10 other American soldiers were killed, and their bodies were unable to be recovered, officials said. Hall, a native of  of Broward County, Florida, was 40 years old at the time of his death and was survived by his wife Mary, according to newspaper clippings. His name has been engraved on the Courts of the Missing at the National Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, and on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C., the DPAA said.  

In 1994, a joint recovery operation by the U.S. and Laos failed to find any of the 11 servicemembers’ remains, but nine years later, a second operation found one set of remains. A 2005 newspaper clipping said that to find the remains, U.S. investigators spoke to Vietnamese commandos who had been involved in the attack. The commandos showed the investigators where they had thrown the bodies of the dead servicemembers off the mountain. Investigators threw dummies from those sites, and used a video camera mounted on a helicopter to see where they landed. 

In 2023, DPAA personnel and partner organization members discovered unexploded ordnance, incident-related materials and possible material evidence and bones near another site on the mountain. Those remains were found to be those of a second technician who died during the attack. 

Joint recovery teams returned to the mountain earlier this year. Across two operations, the teams found possible human remains and other evidence. Those remains were taken to the DPAA Laboratory. 

At the laboratory, DPAA scientists used anthropological analysis and DNA analysis to study the remains. They also used material evidence found at the site to identify the remains as Hall’s. 

Hall’s family was briefed on his identification in last month. A rosette will be placed on his name on the Courts of the Missing and at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to show that he has been accounted for. Hall is set to be buried in Altoona, Kansas in September.