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Press Release | April 29, 2024

Pilot Accounted For From Vietnam War (Kerr, J.)

The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) announced today that U.S. Air Force Maj. John C.G. Kerr, 35, reported missing during the Vietnam War, was accounted for April 24, 2024.

On Aug. 22, 1967, Kerr was piloting an A-26A Invader attack aircraft on a solo nighttime armed reconnaissance mission over the Plain of Jars, Lao People’s Democratic Republic. After Kerr failed to check in via radio and didn’t return from the mission, U.S. forces undertook an extensive electronic and visual search of the estimated area, in which extensive enemy defenses were present, but could not find Kerr or the aircraft. Likely related to this incident, a New China News Agency broadcast reported the Aug. 22 shootdown of an American aircraft near Ban Ban and the deaths of its crewmembers. Kerr was declared Killed in Action on June 4, 1971.

For additional information on the Defense Department’s mission to account for Americans who went missing while serving our country, visit the DPAA website at www.dpaa.mil, find us on social media at www.facebook.com/dodpaa or https://www.linkedin.com/company/defense-pow-mia-accounting-agency.

Kerr’s personnel profile can be viewed at https://dpaa-mil.sites.crmforce.mil/dpaaProfile?id=a0Jt0000000BTbJEAW.