AW2 Michael J. Kennedy
HSL-30  HH-2H
BUNO: 149028
05/20/79
Hometown: Warminster, PA
Shipmates Comments:
Chris Kelly:
AW2 Michael J Kennedy came to 34 as I was getting out. He used to come over to my apartment on the weekends and quietly drink his pint of Jack Daniels. He was a good friend whose abscence has diminished us all. Rest in peace...Mike!
Lt Paul Melotte was my friend. He was an officer in my detachment to the North Atlantic. He was genuinely concerned abuot this young AWAA who loved to fly but was having a hard time with shipboard life.
How ironic that they should both perish in the same bird. I read about the crash for the first time tonight and told my youngest son, of all the officers in the Navy, I wish I could go and see Lt Melotte and show him I made something of my life.
Media Articles:
Approach article July 1981

5 Crewmen Die in 'Ball of Fire' in N.H. As Helicopter From Norfolk Crashes
Washington Post, May 21, 1979
LONDONDERRY, N.H., May 20 (AP)--A U.S. Navy helicopter crashed "in a ball of fire" today and killed all five crew members aboard, authorities said.
Master Sgt. James Duncan of Pease Air Force in Newington said there were no survivors.
Duncan said the craft took off Sunday morning from Norfolk Naval Air Station en route to Brunswick Naval Air Station in Maine.
The dead, all Navy personnel living in the Norfolk area were Lt. Cmdr. Lynwood H. Duncan, 34, originally of Greensboro, N.C.; Lt. Cmdr. James P. Hogan, 34, of Davenport, Iowa; Lt. Paul Melotte, 31, of Funkstown, Md; Petty Officer Second Class Michael J. Kennedy, 25, of Warminster, Pa., and Airman Apprentice Paul J. Dellas, 21, of San Jose, Calif.
The Navy H2 helicopter went down in a field near a sparsely populated residential area in the northern part of this community of about 12,000 south of Manchester.
The Londonderry fire dispatcher said the craft was "a ball of fire" after it hit the ground, but it did not endanger any homes in the area.