POW/MIA INFORMATION:Name: Lonnie Pat Bogard
Rank/Branch: O3/US Air Force
Unit: 435th Tactical Fighter Squadron, Ubon AF TH
Date of Birth: 11 May 1942
Home City of Record: Metairie LA
Date of Loss: 12 May 1972
Country of Loss: Laos
Loss Coordinates: 171200N 1960900E (XE222018)
Status (in 1973): Missing in Action
Category: 4
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: F4D
Other Personnel in Incident: William H. Ostermeyer (missing)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 30 April 1990 from one or more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews.
REMARKS:
SYNOPSIS: Capt. Lonnie P. Bogard, had celebrated his birthday the day before he was assigned a night low-level reconnaissance mission along the Ho Chi Minh trail on May 12, 1972. Bogard was the pilot, and 1Lt. William H. Ostermeyer the electronics officer comprising the crew of an F4D Phantom. The mission went according to plan until after a scheduled mid-air refueling, after which radio contact was lost with the aircraft. At last contact, Bogard and Ostermeyer were near the Ban Karai Pass in Savannakhet Province, Laos.
The Ban Karai Pass was one of several passageways through the mountainous border of Vietnam and Laos. American aircraft flying from Thailand to missions over North Vietnam flew through them regularly, and many aircraft were lost. On the Laos side of the border coursed the "Ho Chi Minh Trail", a road heavily traveled by North Vietnamese troops moving materiel and personnel to their destinations through the relative safety of neutral Laos. The return ratio of men lost in and around the passes is far lower than that of those men lost in more populous areas. This is partly due to the extremely rugged terrain and resulting difficulty in recovery.
The families of Bogard and Ostermeyer understood that the two could have been killed in the incident or captured by either Pathet Lao forces or North Vietnamese.