Cook, Kelly Francis
Air Force Colonel

Kelly Francis Cook from Sioux City, Iowa, Woodbury county.

Service era: Vietnam

Date of death: November 10, 1967
Death details: On November 10, 1967, an F-4C Phantom II (tail number 64-0669) with two crew members took off from Da Nang, South Vietnam, as one of two aircraft on a night strike mission over enemy targets in North Vietnam. A ground controller monitored the flight due to weather in the target area, but lost radar and radio contact with both aircraft as they reached the “bombs away” point in the vicinity of (GC) XE 866 156. Contact could not be reestablished, and both aircraft failed to return from the mission. Hostile presence in the area prevented search efforts for the missing aircraft, and both crew members aboard this Phantom remain unaccounted-for.

Lieutenant Colonel Kelly Francis Cook, who joined the U.S. Air Force from Iowa, was a member of the 366th Tactical Fighter Wing. He was the aircraft commander of the Phantom when it went missing, and his remains have not been recovered. After the incident, the Air Force promoted Lt Col Cook to the rank of Colonel (Col). Today, Colonel Cook is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency