Owen George Skinner, age 37, from Lima, Ohio, Allen county. Their last known residence was in Lima.
Service era: Vietnam
Date of death: December 12, 1970
Death details:
On December 12, 1970, an O-2A Skymaster (tail number 67-21428, call sign “Nail 84”) with two crew members departed Nakhon Phanom Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand, on a nighttime visual reconnaissance mission over central Laos. The aircraft failed to return to base, and was declared missing when its fuel supply would have been exhausted, approximately three hours after the crew’s last radio contact with the airborne command and control center. A search was initiated the following morning and the crash site was located, along with one parachute on the ground nearby, and rescue beeper signals were detected. However, the two missing crew members could not be located, and enemy presence in the area prevented ground search operations.
Major Owen George Skinner, who entered the U.S. Air Force from Ohio, served with the 23rd Tactical Air Support Squadron. He was the navigator aboard this aircraft at the time of its loss on December 12, 1970, and could not be found or recovered following the incident. He remains unaccounted-for. Subsequent to the incident, and while carried in the status of missing in action (MIA), the U.S. Air Force promoted Major Skinner to the rank of Colonel (Col). Today, Colonel Skinner is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
