57 years after Kennewick grad goes MIA, family has glimmer of hope

The sister of Major San D. Francisco has new hope 57 years after a telegram was delivered to her family’s home in Burbank with the awful news that his F-4 Phantom jet was shot down over Vietnam.

Despite an extensive search and rescue mission, he was not found alive, and his body has yet to be recovered and returned home.

Francisco, a 1962 graduate of Kennewick High, was the co-pilot on a reconnaissance mission over the Ho Chi Minh Trail on Nov. 25, 1968.

Francisco was not originally scheduled to be on that flight, which was just days before a planned R&R break with his family after completing the requisite 100 combat missions for his tour of duty.

But when a pilot scheduled for the flight fell ill, Francisco volunteered.

The pilot of the F-4, Major Joseph Morrison, ejected and survived, only to be killed resisting capture. Both of Francisco’s legs were broken, either when he ejected or hit the ground.

Accounts from Vietnamese witnesses say he was being captured when he was hit by shrapnel from American bombs.

One of his sisters, Terri Francisco-Farrell of Kennewick, suspects he was dragged into an open area by his captors in their attempt to ambush the Americans looking for him.

She believes he died after he would not lift his hands to the ladder of his helicopter and put its crew in danger.

Francisco-Farrell has been unrelenting in her efforts to find her older brother.

“I just hope I live long enough to see it happen,” she told the Tri-City Herald as another Veterans Day approached. “It is something that should have been taken care of long ago.”

Francisco’s parents, who died in the mid-‘80s, never learned the details of his death, and Francisco-Farrell only received information after the Quang Bihn province finally was opened to investigators in 2012.

Then witnesses described his death and said he was buried nearby. Because U.S. pilots were valued for propaganda purposes, his body was exhumed and photographed three days later, then reburied in the same grave, they said.

By 2020, first one site and then another identified by witnesses as a possible burial site were excavated, but Francisco was not found.

Then with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, excavations organized by the U.S. government were halted and a third planned excavation for Francisco, was canceled.

Excavations in Vietnam were scheduled to resume last year, but Francisco was not on the list.

But his sister remains hopeful that her will be found after she and her sister attended a session in the Seattle area in April for family members of those still missing in action. They received an update from the U.S. government’s Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, or DPAA.

New plan to find Major Francisco

A written report said that the search for Francisco, who was promoted from first lieutenant to major after his death, has been challenging.

Francisco and Morrison were killed on the ground, with their bodies either placed or left at two locations that were not formally marked or recorded, making the search more difficult.

As the decades have passed, a house has been built and soil dug up near one potential site, the landscape of thick vegetation has changed, and potential witnesses have died.

But the case remains active, and a new search method is proposed by U.S. government officials, which would include the area that was planned to be excavated in 2020, according to the April 2025 DPAA report.

Officials have approved using a drone equipped with a magnetometer, which can detect metals at a greater distance than conventional metal detectors.

It could pick up metal such as in the heels of Francisco’s boots, the zipper of his flight suit or his flight helmet, if it was not taken, Francisco-Farrell said.

Most likely is that it can detect where Americans strafed the area where the F-4 went down with cluster bombs, confirming the location.

The information collected using a magnetometer will be used to guide potential recovery work, according to the DPAA report.

Family and friends maintain a website for the San D. Francisco Awareness Campaign.

“San gave the ultimate sacrifice for his country,” it says. “He deserves to be brought home to American soil now.”

The site recommends contacting Washington’s U.S. senators to maintain attention on the need to bring Francisco home.

Email Sen. Patty Murray through her website at murray.senate.gov/write-to-patty or email Sen. Maria Cantwell through her website at cantwell.senate.gov/contact/email/form.

Letters also may be sent to Sen. Patty Murray, 154 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C., 20510, and to Sen. Maria Cantwell, 511 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C., 20510.