Mullett, Richard Everett
Marines Gunnery sergeant
Richard Everett Mullett, age 26, from Butler, Indiana, DeKalb county.
Service era: Korea
Date of death: June 15, 1952
Death details: On June 15, 1952, an F7F-3N Tigercat (bureau number 80592) carrying two crew members took off from Pyeongtaek Air Base, South Korea, on an armed reconnaissance mission over southwestern North Korea, seeking enemy vehicles along a major road network. The Tigercat worked with an illumination aircraft to light the target area by dropping flares. As the Tigercat entered the target area, its crew reported that the aircraft had suffered a complete failure of both engines. The illumination aircraft’s crew then heard the Tigercat pilot report, “We’ll have to ditch,” indicating the plane was over water; a short while later, the Tigercat pilot reported, “We’re going to bail out.” However, no parachutes were observed following this last radio transmission. Aerial searches failed to locate the crash site or evidence that the crew survived the incident, and the Tigercat and its crew remain unaccounted-for.
Technical Sergeant Richard Everett Mullett entered the U.S. Marine Corps from Indiana and he served with Marine Night Fighter Squadron 513, Marine Air Group 33, 1st Marine Air Wing. He was the airborne intercept operator aboard this Tigercat when it was lost, and he went missing with the aircraft. Today, Technical Sergeant Mullett is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency