Curran, Patrick Robert
Marines Major

Patrick Robert Curran, age 25, from Bensenville, Illinois, DuPage county.

Service era: Vietnam

Date of death: September 29, 1969
Death details: On April 20, 2011, Joint Task Force-Full Accounting (JTF-FA, now DPAA) identified the remains of Major Patrick Robert Curran, missing from the Vietnam War.

Major Curran joined the U.S. Marine Corps from Illinois and was a member of Marine All Weather Attack Squadron 242, Marine Air Group 11. On September 29, 1969, he was the bombardier and navigator aboard an A-6A Intruder (bureau number 15569) on an armed reconnaissance mission over Laos. Major Curran’s aircraft went down at some point during the mission, and he was killed in the incident. Immediate search and rescue efforts launched when the Intruder failed to return were unsuccessful. In February 2000, a joint U.S. and Laotian investigative team excavated a site associated with the intruder’s loss, recovering remains that were later identified as those of Maj Curran.

Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency