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Wall of Honor Level:
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?»?Ken Buell joined the United States Naval Academy from Kankakee, Illinois with the Class of 1963. Upon graduation, Ken reported for Naval Flight Officer training receiving his wings at Corpus Christi, Texas. He was subsequently assigned to Fleet Early Warning Squadron Thirteen, VW-13, at Argentia, Newfoundland flying the Lockheed Warning Star. Ken Buell was reassigned to the Navy?€™s Antarctic Experimental Patrol Squadron, the Ice Pirates.

One result of Ken?€™s Antarctic experience is the Buell Peninsula, An ice-covered peninsula terminating in Cape Williams, located between the lower ends of Lillie, George and Zykov Glaciers, at the NW end of the Anare Mountains. The peninsula was named by Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names for Lieutenant (later Lieutenant Commander) Kenneth R. Buell, U.S. Navy (USN), navigator on aircraft with Squadron VX-6 in Antarctica in 1965-66 and 1966-67. A mountain, Mount Buell, in Antarctica is also named for Ken Buell and commemorates a downed aircraft in which Ken was the navigator.

Ken Later joined the Black Panthers of VA-35, the oldest Navy Attack Squadron and the fourth oldest Navy squadron. He and I were crewed together for almost two years. We were specialists in the Grumman Intruder modified with the Trails Roads Interdiction Module, A6C TRIM. We flew four models of the Intruder during a cruise to the Sixth Fleet. When AMERICA was redirected to Southeast Asia in the summer of 1972, the new Commanding Officer, Commander Verne G. Donnelly, decided to fly the A6C and Ken, the most experienced Bombardier/Navigator was assigned to him.

On September 17, 1972, CDR Donnelly, and LCDR Buell launched from the USS AMERICA in A-6A BuNo 157028 on an armed reconnaissance mission targeted near Hai Duong, North Vietnam. As the aircraft was about eight miles west of that city, it went down. Both crewmen were declared Missing in Act.

Radio Hanoi reported the shoot down of an aircraft on 17 September 1972 in the Hai Hung area and reported a crewman as captured. Neither was subsequently acknowledged by the North Vietnamese nor were returned in the POW release of 1973. On 05 Feb 1991, the U.S. announced that remains returned by the Vietnamese had been positively identified as those of Verne G. Donnelly; after 25 years, he was finally home. As of 31 July 2006, Ken Buell still is serving.

Commander Robert Wesley Covey, USN (Ret)