Say His Name to Remember: 1st Lt. Robert Doten

1LT Robert A. Doten was assigned to the 545th Transportation Company. On the morning of January 4, 1971, following the company formation, while drivers and mechanics were busy with motor stable duties, the officers convened for their daily briefing in the orderly room. A grenade, previously left in one of the company’s 5-ton trucks and found during a vehicle check the prior day, was inside the room. A staff member present during the briefing recounted that 1LT Doten was idly flipping the grenade in the air when the pin accidentally dislodged. This caused immediate panic and led to an explosion that injured several officers, three of them severely, including 1LT Doten. The explosion was heard by the personnel in the motor pool, who initially mistook it for a rocket attack until they saw smoke emanating from the orderly room.  Rushing to assist, they arrived to find devastation and the company commander, CAPT Don Mann, along with another officer, blown through a door outside. Without a medic on site, the team provided first aid as best as they could until emergency medical help arrived. CAPT Mann and 1LT Doten, among others, were urgently airlifted to a medical facility in Cam Ranh Bay, where 1LT Doten later died from his injuries.

[Taken from coffeltdatabase.org and information provided by Herman Gallegos (Mil. Ret.)]