By now you have the information about POW/MIA SSgt. Kier being returned.

If you want to send flowers than please use the Knick Knack or Blossom Shop in Owingsville, KY as they have always supported the POW/MIA issue.

Call Richardson Funeral home to be put on the seating list as seating is limited. Being on the list will not guarantee a seat. Speakers will be mounted outside so that you can hear the services
outside. Main St will be blocked off so that you can park your motorcycle there.

The pall bearers are the presidents of the Kentucky Rolling Thunder chapters and the presidents of the Bopsters, SAG, Peacemakers, and the Vietnam Veterans motorcycle club.

Rev. Lowell Rice and Col. Ron Ray will be saying kind words for SSgt Kier.

This will be one of the most honorable funerals that Kentucky has ever seen.

We are bringing a hero home. Welcome home SSgt Kier.

Danny "Greasy" Belcher
Task Force Omega
Infantry Sgt. Vietnam 68-69
D Troop, 7th Sqdn., 1st Air Cav

The Richardson Funeral Home

Sergeant Larry Gene Kier, Omaha, NE.
Company A, 2nd. Battalion
501st. Infantry 101st Airborne Division

Born Sept. 29, 1949 Died May 6, 1970 Republic of South Vietnam. Positive ID. by DNA.

Services will be held at 1:00 P.M. Saturday, March 30th at the Richardson Funeral Home, Box 68, Owingsville, KY 40360. Phone (606) 674-2922 Fax (606)674-6620. Burial will follow in the Owingsville Cemetery. Due to limited seating please notify funeral home if you plan to attend.

Survived by 1 brother, Vern Kier Jr. of Salt Lick, Ky. Also 2 sisters, Verna Curtis of Omaha, NE and Sharon Kier of Long Beach, CA and 2 nephews.

Directions:
I 64 to exit 121, Hwy. 36 North to U.S. 60 EAST turn right funeral home one block on right, just past post office.

Local florists:
Knick Knack flowers (606)674-6441
Bath Co. Florists (606)674-6754
Blossom Shoppe (606)674-2688

KIER, LARRY GENE
(compiled by Task Force Omega, Inc.)

Name:	Larry Gene Kier
Rank/Branch:	Staff Sergeant/US Army
Unit:	Company A,  2nd Battalion,  501st Infantry,  101st Airborne Division
Date of Birth:	29 September 1949 (Shenandoah, IA)
Home of Record:	Omaha, NE
Date of Loss:	06 May 1970
Country of Loss:	South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates:	163840N 1065600E (YD081411)
Status in 1973:	Missing in Action
2Category:	2
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground:	Ground
Other Personnel In Incident:	Refugio T. Teran (missing)
Other Information:	http://www.pownetwork.org/bios/k/k065.htm

SYNOPSIS:   On May 6, 1970, then PFC Larry G. Kier, rifleman, was assigned to Company A; and PFC Refugio T. "Tom" Teran, rifleman, assigned to different company. Both companies were part of the 2nd Battalion, 501st Infantry, 101st Airborne Division. Likewise, both companies were assigned to defend an ammunition storage area near the Henderson Hill Artillery Fire Support Base located in the forested hills on the north side of Highway 9 approximately 10 miles east- northeast of Khe Sanh and the same distance northeast of the South Vietnamese/Lao border. It was also roughly 11 miles south-southwest of Firebase Vandergrift, 16 miles west-southwest of Quang Tri City, and 18 miles south of the demilitarized zone (DMZ), Quang Tri Province, South Vietnam.

At about 0500 hours, Viet Cong (VC) forces overran a guard station at the ammunition storage facility. During the brutal attack initiated in the pre-dawn hours that continued for hours, 33 Americans were killed. In the chaos of battle, Larry Kier and Tom Teran were last seen running toward a barricade close to the storage area. Both men were believed to safely reach different firing positions behind it.

PFC Kier moved from the barricade to a bunker with two other soldiers. VC soldiers threw a satchel charge against the bunker. When it exploded, one of the Americans was killed and the second soldier wounded. The ammunition storage area itself was located within 20 meters of the bunker. It was hit by enemy ground fire, exploded and began to burn furiously. The wounded soldier was rescued, but he was unable to accurately report what happened to Larry Kier.

Meanwhile the barricade itself was hit by at least one enemy rocket-propelled grenade (PRG) in the area where PFC Teran was believed to be fighting from. Napalm canisters stored nearby ignited and leaked their blazing fluid into American firing positions along the barricade. Everything in the path of the napalm was decimated.

Later that day Henderson Hill and the adjacent ammunition storage dump was once again under US control. The next day a search and recovery (SAR) team from Graves Registration began the grizzly task of collecting bodies of the dead and separating the American bodies from the enemy's. While the team found no trace of Larry Kier and Tom Teran anywhere in the fire support base, they did find 5 other soldiers who were believed killed during the fierce fighting, but who were very much alive. All five men had been wounded during the attack. The remains of the 33 dead soldiers were transported to a US mortuary facility where they were subsequently identified. Each man's remains were subsequently returned to his family for burial. At the time search efforts were terminated, both Larry Kier and Tom Teran were listed Missing in Action.

After Operation Homecoming in 1973, all returned POWs were debriefed about other prisoners they had knowledge of while in captivity. One of the returnees reported that he thought Larry Kier was the prisoner he saw the day prior to release. That man was being held in isolation in Building 33 at the Hoa Lo Prison Camp, better known as the Hanoi Hilton. The prisoner did not know the hand signals developed by the POWs to communicate surreptitiously with each other.

In August 1991, a Vietnamese resident turned over the partially melted identity card belonging to PFC Kier together with two small bone fragments. The bones were reportedly recovered during 1987 from an unspecified location and were turned over to a US representative in Hanoi. The fragments were transported to the US Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii (CIL-HI) for examination and possible identification. However, to date no identification has been made.

If Larry Kier and Tom Teran died in the fierce battle for Henderson Hill's ammunition storage dump, they have a right to have their remains returned to their families, friends and country if at all possible. However, if they were captured by communist forces and removed from the battle site when the enemy retreated, their fate, like that of other Americans who remain unaccounted for, could be quite different.

Since the end of the Vietnam War well over 21,000 reports of American prisoners, missing and otherwise unaccounted for have been received by our government. Many of these reports document LIVE America Prisoners of War remaining captive throughout Southeast Asia TODAY.

American military men were called upon to fly and fight in many dangerous circumstances, and they were prepared to be wounded, killed or captured. It probably never occurred to them that they could be abandoned by the country they so proudly served.

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Published on: 2005-06-21 (2993 reads)