Jeffords, Derrell Blackburn
Air Force Colonel

Derrell Blackburn Jeffords, age 40, from Maricopa County Arizona.

Service era: Vietnam

Date of death: Friday, December 24, 1965
Death details: On March 5, 2012, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC, now DPAA) identified the remains of Colonel Derrell Blackburn Jeffords, missing from the Vietnam War. Colonel Jeffords entered the U.S. Air Force from South Carolina and was a member of the 4th Air Commando Squadron. On December 24, 1965, he was the pilot of an AC-47D Spooky (serial number unknown) that carried five other crew members on an armed reconnaissance mission against enemy targets over southern Laos. The gunship aircraft crashed during the mission in Savannakhet Province and Col Jeffords was killed in the incident along with the other crew members, but his remains were not recovered at the time. In 1995, a joint U.S./Laotian team investigated a location in Savannakhet Province that led the team to the Spooky’s crash site and recovery of aircraft wreckage. The team returned to the site in 1999 to 2001, and again in 2010 and 2011, and recovered human remains, personal items, and military equipment. Modern forensic techniques identified Col Jeffords among the remains recovered.

Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency