Joseph Bernard Jr. Copack from Chicago, Illinois, Cook county.
Service era: Vietnam
Date of death: Wednesday, August 16, 1978
Death details: On June 20, 1989, the Central Identification Laboratory-Hawaii (CILH, now DPAA) identified the remains of Captain Joseph Bernard Copack Jr., missing from the Vietnam War.
Captain Joseph Bernard Copack Jr. joined the U.S. Air Force from Illinois and was a member of the 22nd Bombardment Squadron. On December 22, 1972, he was the navigator aboard a B-52D Stratofortress (tail number 550061) on a night strike mission over Hanoi, Vietnam. The B-52D was downed by a surface-to-air missile during the mission, and Capt Copack died in the incident. Heavy enemy presence in the area precluded search and recovery efforts for Capt Copack and the rest of the B-52D’s crew. In December 1988, the Vietnamese government returned a set of unidentified remains to U.S. custody that were later identified as those of Capt Copack.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency