A Note from The Virtual Wall
The casualty database contains the names of seven men who died when a helicopter was shot down in Thua Thien Province on 23 Apr 1969. Staff Sergeant Julian Dedman is one of them. The L Co/75th Infantry web site says that "Julian D. Dedman was in a helicopter that was hit by ground fire, exploded and burned."
Only one helicopter is known to have gone down in Thua Thien on 23 April: a UH-1H (tail number 67-17697) belonging to the C Troop, 2nd Squadron, 17th Cav, 101st Airborne. Two of the seven men lost are known to have been aircrewmen aboard 67-17697; by deductive reasoning one can conclude the other five men were aboard as well, since that was the only aircraft lost. The seven men were
- C Troop, 2/17th Cav aircrewmen killed when 67-17697 was shot down:
- SGT Otto Philip Barnhart, crew chief, C/2/17th Cav
- SGT Henry Waters Cardwell, gunner, C/2/17th Cav
- Passengers killed when a helicopter was shot down in Thua Thien on 4/23/69:
- SFC William Frank Rocco, passenger, HHT/2/17th Cav
- SSG Julian Dean Dedman, passenger, L Co, 75th Infantry
- SP4 James Phillip Heim, passenger, D/2/17th Cav
- SP4 John Francis Koehler, passenger, B/2/17th Cav
- SP4 John Werner Tiderencel, passenger, D/2/17th Cav
Lucio Vazquez, at the time a crewman with C/2/17th Cav, remembers the incident:
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This was my mission but SP4 Barnhart talked me out of flying that day and crewed in my place. The mission was to rappel a LRRP and an engineering team through some very tall trees so they could cut a new Landing Zone in the A Shau Valley. This was the first of four Hueys over this site which happened to be on a well-fortified NVA camp. I estimate the trees were well over 100 feet tall and that the team had a 150 foot rappel. The NVA shot the hovering Huey either with tracers into the fuel cell or with an RPG because the aircraft suddenly exploded without any call or signs of trouble. The front part of the ship with both pilots strapped in their seats separated from the rest of the Huey in the explosion and was blown well over 40 feet from the rest of the wreck. I believe one of the pilots was a CW3 and the other was a CPT. Both survived the explosion and the fall; but I seem to recall that the CPT died a few days later. The CW3's seat landed so that he was facing up toward the sky. He was paralyzed from the neck down. CONDOR BLUE aborted the mission but returned with another helicopter unit and more troops. This force was inserted at a few locations a hundred yards or so from the site of the exploded Huey. It took them 6 to 8 hours to recover the pilots and what remained of the others on the ship. I don't recall if the LRRPs or the engineers had any casualties, but I'd be surprised if they didn't.
Taken from the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots' Assn database
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The information available to The Virtual Wall is not sufficient to confirm that Staff Sergeant Dedman was aboard 67-17697 but it seems fairly certain that he was ... there is no other candidate aircraft.
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