KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. -- On September 26, 1997, the Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command (JPAC, now DPAA) identified the remains of Tech. Sgt. Allen Jones Avery, Vietnam veteran MIA.
Native of Massachusetts, Avery was a member of the 37th Air Rescue and Recovery Squadron at Da Nang Air Base, Vietnam. On April 6, 1972, he was one of six crew members aboard a U.S. Air Force HH-53C Super Jolly Green Giant helicopter on a rescue mission over Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. The aircraft was hit by enemy ground fire and crashed in Quang Tri Province, killing all six members of its crew. Immediate search efforts were unable to locate the crash site. However, between 1989 and 1992, a joint U.S./Vietnamese search team located the crash site and recovered human remains. Eventually, forensic techniques were able to individually identify Avery among the remains recovered.
Avery received two silver star medals for his devotion to duty.
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Sources: https://dpaa-mil.sites.crmforce.mil/dpaaProfile?id=a0Jt000000oW60rEAC