The current guardian of this Remembrance Page is Andrew Beard-Family.
If you knew or served with this Sailor and have additional information or photos to support this Page,
please leave a message for the Page Administrator(s)
HERE
This Sailor has an (IMO) Memory Of Headstone in Courts of the Missing, Honolulu, Hawaii
Attack Squadron 82 was reactivated 01 May 1967 and equipped with the A-7A light attack aircraft. LCDR David Scott Greiling was a "plank-owner" and Department Head in the squadron. VA-82 deployed aboard USS AMERICA (CV-66) as part of Carrier Air Wing 6. The ship departed Norfolk, Virginia, in April 1968 for its first Viet Nam cruise. AMERICA began combat operations immediately upon her arrival on Yankee Station in early May. By late July, the air wing was fully seasoned and engaged in day and night combat operations in North Vietnam and the NVN/Laotian border areas.
On 24 July, LCDR Greiling led a section (2 aircraft) on a night armed reconnaissance mission -- a truck-busting mission. The section undertook an attack on a truck convoy in the vicinity of Cape Mui Ron, NVN. LCDR Greiling, as lead, was first in. His wingman observed a large explosion and fires in the target area and initially considered them to be the result of Greiling's attack. However, when he realized that he had lost radio contact with Greiling, he also realized that the explosion and residual fire probably represented a crash site.
Other air wing aircraft in the area immediately undertook combat SAR. The crash site was on the side of a karst ridgeline, about 500 feet below the crest. No beeper was heard, nor was there any radio contact with Greiling. Following-day SAR efforts failed to locate Greiling, who was placed in MIA status.
In 1969, a Polish seaman reported evidence that Greiling was a captive in North Vietnam. Although his status was changed from MIA to POW, the North Vietnamese never acknowledged capturing LCDR Greiling, and he did not return with the POWs released in early 1973. The returning POWs knew nothing of LCDR Greiling's fate. On 14 Sep 1973, the Secretary of the Navy approved a Presumptive Finding of Death for him, changing his status from POW to "Died while Captured."
Within the air wing, the concensus was that LCDR David Scott Greiling died that night -- it was overcast with multiple cloud layers and mountains rising above the pull-out altitude, not a good night for low-level visual bombing.
