1. Iceal Eugene "Gene" Hambleton was a career United States Air Force navigator who was shot down over South Vietnam during the 1972 Easter Offensive.
16 Facts About Iceal Hambleton
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Iceal Hambleton was aboard an EB-66 aircraft whose call sign was Bat 21.
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Iceal Hambleton survived for eleven and one half days behind enemy lines until he was retrieved in a ground operation.
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Iceal Hambleton's rescue was the longest and most costly search and rescue mission during the entire Vietnam War.
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Iceal Hambleton received the Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal and a Purple Heart during his career.
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Iceal Hambleton then worked during the 1960s on various USAF ballistic missile projects such as the PGM-19 Jupiter, Titan I ICBM and Titan II ICBM.
7.
Iceal Hambleton switched from the Strategic Air Command to Seventh Air Force and was assigned to the 42nd Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron in Korat, Thailand as a navigator.
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On his 63rd mission, on April 2,1972, Iceal Hambleton was a navigator aboard an EB-66C gathering signals intelligence, including identifying enemy anti-aircraft radar installations, to enable jamming.
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Iceal Hambleton was the only one of the three-man crew able to eject from the crashing aircraft.
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Iceal Hambleton parachuted into the middle of the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive and landed in the midst of tens of thousands of North Vietnamese soldiers.
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Iceal Hambleton had received water survival training at Homestead Air Force Base, Florida, and escape and evasion training and survival basics at the Pacific Air Command Jungle Survival School in the Philippines.
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Iceal Hambleton said after the war that he felt sure if he were captured that he would never have been taken to Hanoi.
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Iceal Hambleton died on September 19,2004, in Tucson, Arizona, at age 85.
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Iceal Hambleton was interred in Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery, Elwood, Illinois.
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Iceal Hambleton was awarded the Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal and a Purple Heart during his career.
16.
Mysteries of the Unknown - Season 3, Episode 129, Aired on May 13,2024, did a segment recounting Iceal Hambleton's amazing escape and rescue, detailing how the US used coded messages to direct Iceal Hambleton to a safe rescue point.