ARMY

CHINOOK CREWMAN

By Ron Eckhart


Copyright 2016 by Ronald L. Eckhart
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof
may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever
without the express written permission of the author
except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

INTRODUCTION

This book describes many of the experiences that occurred during my short time in the
U.S. Army in the early 1970s. I have prepared this from memory and, although most of
the memories still seem vivid, I must admit that some of the details Ive recalled may be
inaccurate. If you were there and remember things differently, Im not surprised thats
the nature of memories, we each have our own.
I havent used anyones real name, except my own, because my intent isnt to embarrass
or praise anyone; I just want to explain how I think things actually happened and give a
hint about the true nature of being in the army in Viet Nam, at least as I saw it. There
have been a lot of hero books written about Viet Nam but not many about the regular
guys who found themselves there in support roles. The vast majority of the 1 million plus
men who were sent to Viet Nam during the 10 year war were there as support for the
relatively few who were actually doing the fighting. Mine was definitely a support
position and Ive tried to include only those things I thought someone might find
interesting in this narrative.
I doubt you will enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it but I hope you will find
parts of it interesting. I had taken a lot of photographs while I was there and Ive included
several to illustrate the accompanying narrative.

CONTENTS
Enlistment
Basic
Advanced Individual Training (AIT)
Viet Nam
Bunker Guard
Off-Base trips
Flight Status
First Flying Experiences
Drugs
Working at Night
Recovering Aircraft
Receiving Fire
Rockets
Standby
Crash
Flight Engineer
September 16, 1970
Unvolunteering
Promotion
Back to the USA
Officer Records Specialist
ETS

ENLISTMENT
The Second World War had ended six years before my birth so I grew up in a time
and place when all adults had witnessed or participated in the great victory over Japan,
Germany and Italy. My father and most of my uncles had served in the enlisted ranks,
generally in support roles rather than combat, and they often talked about their
experiences during the war. My dad was an Army cook and truck driver and spent the war
in the U.S. and Newfoundland. Although they became repetitive in time, my dads stories
were interesting, normally funny and I was taught, unintentionally, the military was a great
thing to experience. Dad was just recalling the happier times of his young adulthood but
to me, he was giving witness to the Army slogan I would later learn of Fun, Travel and
Adventure. I played Army with my friends growing up, I was an avid John Wayne fan
and I never missed episodes of the Combat! television series so I was thoroughly
indoctrinated by the time I graduated from high school.
After high school, my friend Brian and I were working as mechanics at an auto
dealership. I had a few jobs after high school and this was the most promising of the
bunch but it was still drudgery for me. I knew everything I had done to this point in my
life was temporary but I wasnt really sure what I would consider permanent. I didnt
have the money or desire to go to college and my father was encouraging me to go to an
automotive trade school but that really didnt interest me either. Obviously, the Viet Nam
war and the draft were major considerations for any career decision of an 18 year old male
in 1969. Many of my friends had already enlisted or been drafted so I think I was really
just waiting for the government to make a career choice for me.
During a particularly boring, hot summer day at work, Brian and I decided to
volunteer for the draft. We could get our two years of military service behind us and be in
a much better position to get on with our future; at least that was our rationalization. We
arrived at the draft board before noon the next day but the door was locked. As we tugged
on the door and wondered aloud if they were at lunch, an Army sergeant in the next office
asked if he could help us. We told him we came to volunteer for the draft. Theyre
closed today but will be back tomorrow, he said. As we turned to leave, the Army
sergeant said, You know, fellas, if you volunteer for the draft, youll go to Viet Nam and
get killed.
How could we respond? He was sitting there in his uniform with stripes and ribbons
and gold badges and brass buttons he obviously knew what he was talking about. He
then said, If you sign up for three years in the Army, you can do anything you want and
you wont go to Viet Nam. What are you fellas doing now? We both said we were
mechanics and his one word response was Helicopters. He then explained all the
training we would get along with all the fun, travel and adventure the Army was known
for. We could go in under the buddy system and would basically spend our time in the
Army together, working on helicopters and having a great time with no worries about Viet
Nam.
After a few minutes of discussion, Brian and I were convinced so we signed up for

the three year enlistment. We didnt sleep on it or talk it over with our folks it was,
Screw it, lets do it. A decision making process I would repeat in the future with similar
regrets. At that time, the nightly network news regularly featured film clips of fighting in
Viet Nam. They would show the us vs them KIA counts next to the news announcer
so getting killed in Viet Nam had a very real meaning to us. I didnt know anyone who
had actually been killed in the war but I had a buddy who had dropped out of school and
was in the infantry in Viet Nam when Brian and I enlisted. His letters didnt dwell on
what he was doing but I could tell he was in a shitty place, physically and emotionally.
Avoiding a tour in Viet Nam as a draftee by adding an extra year of service by enlisting
seemed like a reasonable decision, but to my 18 year-old mind, that extra year did seem
like an awfully long time.
After completing the paperwork, we were given dates for physicals and asked if we
would like to have a delayed entry of thirty days. Im not sure why the Army did that,
probably to make their planning process easier, but it seemed like a good idea so we
agreed. A few days after signing up, we had our physicals and we both passed with no
problems.
After the thirty days, we arrived at the induction center in downtown Cincinnati early
in the morning ready and anxious to go. After checking in, we were told to strip down to
our undershorts and line up in front of an office for a final physical check-up. I was in line
in front of Brian and, when it was my turn, entered the office to stand in front of an officer
sitting behind a desk. He asked, Has anything changed since your last physical? I said,
No and he told me to put on my clothes and go down the hall to the waiting area. It
occurred to me that we could have had that discussion with my clothes on but it was the
first of many strange things I was to experience over the next few years.
As I was sitting in the waiting room with the other inductees, Brian opened the door,
stuck in his head and said, See you later, man. They dont want me. For a second, I
thought he was fooling around but as he turned to leave, I jumped up and said Wait a
minute! What do you mean they dont want you?! As we were walking down the hall,
Brian explained that he had a minor physical problem since birth and it had never bothered
him but the Army decided it disqualified him from service. Brian was clearly
disappointed. It had to be terribly disheartening to plan and anticipate such a momentous
change in your life, only to be told, at the last minute, that you werent physically fit for
it. Obviously, the Army knew about Brians problem after our first physical a month ago
but for some reason, decided not to tell Brian until the day we were to leave. Brian had
burned a few bridges during the delayed entry period so his sudden change in plans was
even more troubling than it should have been. Selfishly, I was less concerned with Brians
disappointment than I was about going into the Army on the Buddy System without a
Buddy.
So, Brian went home and I went to Fort Dix.

BASIC
At Fort Dix, we were put in casual status for a few days before they started
processing us into basic training and we slept in old two-story wooden barracks. We were
still in civilian clothes and there was absolutely nothing for us to do so we spent our time
talking about our future and wondering/worrying about what the Army was going to be
like. During this time, we were told to rid ourselves of all contraband because everything
we had would be searched and we would be in deep shit if we had anything we shouldnt.
They were pretty vague about the nature of the contraband they were referring to but we
guessed they were talking about knives or drugs. The closest thing I had that could
possibly be considered contraband was my fake ID and I spent several hours trying to
decide what to do with it. For a year or so, I had a drivers license, draft card and social
security card for a person that was over 21 and I had used them quite a bit over the past
year especially during the 30 day delayed entry period. I even renewed the drivers
license when it expired (which required an awkward explanation of why I had lost 30
pounds the real owner was a bit heavier than me) so I really wanted to keep them. I
finally decided I probably wouldnt have much use for them now that I was in the Army
(I have no idea how I made that connection) and I really did not want to start my Army
career in deep shit so I tore them up and put them in an empty soda can. There was no
search.
Processing into the Army required a lot of standing in line, filling out paper work,
drawing equipment and taking aptitude tests. At one point in the process, I was sitting at a
PFCs desk and saw my personnel folder. There was a large A+ written in red grease
pencil across the front cover and I was pleasantly surprised the Army thought so highly of
me so soon. We hadnt even started training yet and I already had an A+! As I talked to
the PFC, I sadly learned the red A+ was my blood type: A positive.
Basic training was pretty uneventful but it was a bitch physically. There was a lot of
PT (physical training), marching, running and classroom work and I was always tired and
hungry. I wasnt into sports in high school and I had started smoking when I was 16 so the
two months of basic, though difficult, had me in better physical condition than I had ever
been, or would ever be, despite always being one of the first to light up when the smoke
em if you got em command was given. Physical training was definitely the focus of the
two months of basic. The rest of the training taught us a little about a lot of different
things but not a lot about anything.
Throughout our training we were always cautioned that if we didnt master whatever
subject was being taught, Charlie would use our ignorance to kill us. We were
introduced to the various nicknames for the Viet Namese Papa San, Momma San, Baby
San, Charlie, Gook, VC, Victor Charles and my personal favorite, Luke the Gook. The
Viet Cong werent humanized; they were just the enemy and would do anything to kill us.
Shit-dipped punji stakes, tripwires, land mines they would even send kids and old
ladies with grenades into a group of G.I.s to blow themselves up in hopes of killing
Americans. They were truly evil. It was a very effective indoctrination process after all,
it would be hard to convince fine American youth to actually kill people who were just

normal. They had to be evil or we wouldnt be there. We didnt realize there was a
psychological aspect to the training we were receiving at the time but it was there and it
was just as effective on our minds as the constant 8-count push-ups were on our bodies.
We were kids and always too tired, too hungry and too busy to do anything except listen
and accept what the instructors were telling us. Many of the brief evil VC anecdotes
were unnerving and the fear was often visible on the faces of the draftees who knew they
were destined for Viet Nam and the infantry. Since I had enlisted, I could smugly listen to
the stories with some detachment, since I wouldnt be going there, thanks to the recruiter.
Our basic training company included a mix of draftees, volunteers like me, national
guardsmen and reservists. As you could expect, we had an incredible variety of people in
our group. The largest guy in our company was really big (tall and overweight) but he had
a gentle nature. He explained to us that even though he was big, his mom never let him
play sports because she was afraid he would get hurt. He was determined to get through
basic, however, so he really gave it everything he had. Early in the training cycle, during
our early morning runs before breakfast, he would be seen tumbling into the ditch along
the road about halfway through the run. He would actually run until he collapsed. His
determination even impressed the drill instructors and they began giving him special
attention to help get him in shape. His progress was remarkable and he did graduate with
the rest of the company.
The drill instructors compassion for the big guy didnt prevent them from having a
little fun, however. All of the training we received was preparation for the tests we would
have to take to graduate and we often practiced the various parts of the physical portion of
the tests. One of the six phases of the physical test was known as the 150 yard man carry
where you were paired with another recruit. One of the recruits would carry the other, as
quickly as possible, for 150 yards. At the end of the 150 yard course, the positions would
be reversed and the two would then hurry back to the starting point. Ideally, the pairings
would be recruits of approximately the same size but the drill instructors always paired the
big guy with the smallest recruit in our group. The first couple of times they did this, the
little guy would simply collapse when the big guy hopped on his back and they couldnt
complete the course. Eventually, however, the two came up with a way for the big guy to
straddle the smaller recruit and leave most of his weight on one foot, which he used to hop
down the course.
There was another fellow we would often see around the company area walking to or
from the mess hall. He walked slowly, stiffly; taking very short steps and his fatigue pant
legs were never bloused, like everyone else. The rumor was that he had been injured in a
previous training cycle and the Army was keeping him around until he recovered. It was
also rumored the Army thought he was faking and was going to keep him until he gave up
the charade. It was unnerving to see him shuffle down the street, alone, and it was even
more impetus for us to get the hell out of basic. The most fearsome threat the drill
instructors had was that you could be recycled or made to start from the beginning if
you didnt do it right the first time. I definitely wanted out of basic.
We also had a draftee who wasnt buying into the program at all. He, too, was

overweight but he was short and had no desire to exert himself to make it through the
program. It was rumored he was a radio disk jockey before he was drafted, as if that
explained his attitude. He was willing to go through the process at his own pace, until, he
hoped, they finally gave up and threw him out of the Army. The drill instructors tried to
make his life as miserable as possible but it didnt seem to bother him. When we were on
long marches, he quickly fell behind and walked at his own slow pace, oblivious to the
assistant drill instructor screaming in his ear. On long marches, the drill instructors finally
had him low crawl when he fell far behind the rest of us and the last memory I have of
him is low crawling into our bivouac area hours after the rest of us had arrived and set up
our tents. He didnt appear exhausted or upset just oblivious.
In addition to the daily training we received, we were often selected for additional
work details. KP or Kitchen Police was probably the worse but we also cleaned the
orderly room, unloaded trucks and generally did any menial tasks that needed to be done.

The one time I had KP, I was assigned Pots and Pans and spent most of 12 hours
scraping, washing, rinsing and drying all the pots and pans needed to prepare meals for
several hundred men. Between the breakfast and lunch cleaning, I ran the automatic
potato peeler which was a tub with abrasive sides that removed the potato skins as the
drum rotated. I loaded the potatoes into the drum, turned it on and then dumped the
peeled potatoes into a pan. When the last of the potatoes were peeled, it was necessary, of
course, to then clean the potato peeler. After cleaning the potato peeler and the pots and
pans from lunch, a major toured the kitchen and found some crud I had missed on one of
the pans so I had to wash all of them once more. After that, a truck arrived with the
insulated containers used to feed the troops on field exercises so I had to clean them as
well. Is there no end to this I thought. After all the pots and pans from dinner were
cleaned and inspected, we were finally released to return to our barracks. I was exhausted
but the stench from the kitchen permeated my fatigues so I took a long, hot shower and
went to bed.
The rest of the company had been on a field exercise the day I had KP and worked
late into the night on night fire training. They returned to the barracks after midnight
and one of the drill instructors noticed me, sound asleep in my bunk, when they returned.
My friend explained that I had KP that day and the drill instructor decided to have a little
fun. He asked for a can of shaving cream and filled my outstretched hand with the foam.
He then tickled my nose with a shoe lase until I scratched it, smearing the shaving cream
all over my face. Still half asleep, I realized what had happened and thinking my friend
responsible, muttered, You asshole. When I finally woke up enough to focus on the
person standing over me, I was horrified to see that it was the most feared drill instructor
we had. It was pretty well understood that a trainee should not call a drill instructor an
asshole under any circumstances so expecting the worse, I lay there waiting for whatever
punishment he decided appropriate. To my surprise and relief, he just laughed and left the
room.
Basic training finally ended and, as specified in my enlistment, I was assigned to

helicopter school in Fort Eustis, Virginia. The Army put a bunch of us on a bus at Fort
Dix and sent us directly to Virginia.

ADVANCED INDIVIDUAL TRAINING (AIT)

I was assigned to a CH-47 or Chinook training class upon arrival at Fort Eustis. The
type of helicopter I would be working on was never specified in my enlistment so working
on a Chinook was a surprise. At that time, I didnt know one helicopter from another but
the Chinook looked interesting. Its a cargo helicopter with two large rotors on top, rather
than the one large rotor on top and a smaller tail rotor in the back, like most other
helicopters. It can carry cargo inside, which is loaded over a retractable ramp in the rear,
and it can carry cargo slung below from a hook. The Chinook was also one of the fastest
helicopters in the Army, which surprised me since its so large. In Viet Nam, the
Chinooks had to slow down when being escorted by gunships because they couldnt match
the Chinooks speed. The body of the Chinook was approximately 50 feet long and 12 feet
wide and each of the six rotor blades is nearly 30 feet long. It has two turbine engines that
drive the blades through five transmissions plus a smaller turbine used as an auxiliary
power unit (APU). As I was to learn over the coming months, the Chinook is an
incredibly complex aircraft and there were a lot of things that could potentially go wrong.

There were 11 men assigned to our training class so we got to know each other pretty
well during nearly 3 months of training. Three of the eleven in our class were draftees and
enjoyed reminding the rest of us they only had two years to serve while the rest of us had
three. I have to admit I began to wonder at this point if the recruiting guy had been
completely honest with me. The buddy plan hadnt worked out and the fun, travel and
adventure wasnt as enjoyable, so far, as I had hoped.
I was surprised to find two guys from my home town, George and Daniel, in a
Chinook class a few weeks ahead of mine. I believe they had enlisted under the buddy
system also, so they had spent basic together and were now in the same AIT class.
Our barracks at Fort Eustis were metal building arranged in an H pattern and
attached in the middle with a section containing the latrine (showers, sinks and toilet
stalls). The barracks were divided into two-man cubicles containing two bunks (stacked),
a desk and a chair. A partition wall, nearly to the ceiling, separated the cubicles with
lockers forming the central aisle. Each of the barracks had an NCO who lived in a cubicle
by himself and he was responsible for keeping things in order, assigning details and
generally watching over the students. In our barracks, Sergeant Fuller had that honor with
Sergeant Johnson on the other side.
Sergeant Fuller was perpetually pissed-off and we generally tried our best to stay
away from him. He was the type of NCO who enjoyed making our life as difficult as
possible just for the hell of it. Sergeant Johnson, on the other side of our H where
Daniel and George lived, was a career NCO (Lifer). Most of us felt he exemplified the
Army. He was overweight, from the South and apparently not well educated. Sergeant
Johnson was in charge of a lot of the work details in the company, watching over
students who had been assigned extra duty, sometimes as punishment and sometimes just
because they were at the wrong place when a warm body was needed. I dont think he was

mean or malicious like Sergeant Fuller; he just seemed clueless. If someone was horsing
around in the ranks he would always shout, I KNOWS WHO YOU IS! though it was
obvious he had no idea.
I shared a cubicle with Martin, a draftee from Connecticut who actually had a civilian
pilots license. He was probably the smartest guy in our group and normally scored higher
on the tests than the rest of us. One weekend Martin and I rented a Cessna at a local flying
club and he let me take the controls for a few minutes as we flew over the Virginia
countryside. I loved maneuvering the little aircraft but I found it more difficult than it
appear so I was impressed with Martins piloting skills.
Chip and Randy from our group were in the next cubicle. Chip was an introvert from
Philadelphia with a distinct Philly accent and quick wit. I dont recall Randy talking about
his hometown but he was the hippie in our group. Randy had completed some college
before joining the Army so he became a social mentor for some of us. Though I would
never admit it, I looked up to Randy a little for his college background and he taught me
how to meditate and explained his belief in transmigration of souls. It might have all been
bullshit but I was impressed. Randy also seemed to be broke all the time and once stole
the latest Beatles album from the nearby PX Annex by slipping it under his field jacket.
Randy HATED the Army yet, surprisingly, he had volunteered like I had. Probably
hoping, like me, to avoid Viet Nam.
A normal day in AIT started very early with everyone taking care of their personal
needs, eating breakfast and then falling-in for the morning formation. Occasionally, there
would be a little PT in the morning but it was nothing like basic. After formation, we
broke into our individual class groups and marched off to school. School included
classroom training, quizzes and hands-on exercises. The instructors were all NCOs,
experienced Chinook mechanics and most of them had been in Viet Nam. The instructors
were actually very good and we learned a lot in the short time we were in training.
Our training was limited, however, because the Chinook is a very complex aircraft
and we had a limited amount of time to learn its systems. We were to be the generalists on
the Chinook relying on specialists in avionics, electronics, engine repair, sheet metal,
hydraulics, etc. to maintain/repair the equipment in their areas of expertise.
It was winter when I was in Virginia and it was often very cold, especially early in the
morning. One day a week, we had to exchange our sheets and pillow case at the supply
room before we went to class. Adding this task to our normal morning ritual of
showering, cleaning up our area and having breakfast meant we rushed around a little
more than usual. One morning I had just exchanged my bed linen and was rushing back to
the barracks with them tucked under my arm and my hands in my pockets when one of the
many dark figures I was passing shouted, SOLDIER!! DONT YOU KNOW HOW TO
SALUTE?? It was still dark and there were no lights between the barracks and the
supply room so I was surprised that even our asshole lieutenant XO would give anyone
crap about not saluting. I couldnt see his rank, he was just a silhouette in the blackness
and no one else was saluting him so how was I supposed to know he was an officer? I
briefly considered continuing on, as if I didnt realize he was talking to me but I knew that

would only make things worse. The Army was full of these little senseless annoyances so
I came to attention, give him a lackluster salute until he returned it and told me to
CARRY ON!
In those days, and it varied by state, people between 18 and 21 could buy beer with
3.2% alcohol but you had to be over 21 to buy regular beer, wine and liquor. There was an
EM club on Ft. Eustis that catered to the enlisted men below the NCO ranks and it only
served 3.2% beer. I went there once and found it to be a terrible place it was brightly lit
with linoleum tile floors and it smelled like stale beer and vomit. It was full of cigarette
smoke and drunk students who were all talking too loudly, to be heard over the country
music. To get drunk, which was really the only reason anyone would go there, you had to
drink a lot of 3.2% beer. Daniel, one of my friends from home, went to the EM club one
night and drank quite a bit, staggered back to the barracks and went to bed. As could be
expected, he had to piss shortly after falling asleep and to get to the latrine from his
cubicle; he would turn left into the hallway, walk to the middle of the barracks and turn
right into the latrine. Sergeant Johnsons cubicle happened to be two cubicles on the right
before the latrine and, unfortunately, Daniel turned right too soon. As Daniel later
explained, I remember coming back to the barracks and going to bed. The next thing I
remember, Sergeant Johnson is yelling at me as I stood there pissing on him. Daniel,
vaguely aware of what he had done, started running though the barracks with Sergeant
Johnson close behind shouting, I KNOWS WHO YOU IS! I KNOWS WHO YOU IS! I
KNOWS WHO YOU IS!
Daniel received an Article 15 (non-judicial disciplinary action) and lost some rank as
a result of the episode. All of us who went through Chinook school were promoted to
Specialist 4 when we graduated and I think Daniel graduated as a Private. He was also
sent to Korea after AIT while the rest of his class, including his buddy, George, was sent
to Viet Nam. If we knew pissing on Sergeant Johnson would make you ineligible for Viet
Nam, Im sure it would have become a nightly ritual.
During one of our morning formations, our XO decided it would be a good idea to
pick troops at random from the ranks and have them march their platoons around the
assembly area. I dont know why, since we were a bunch of mechanics with specialists
ranks, which meant we werent supposed to command troops. It was just another lets
mess with the troops episode our XO seemed to enjoy. As was my practice, I was in the
middle of our formation trying to be as unnoticeable as possible but, for some reason, I
was selected to march our platoon. Though I had done a lot of marching in my short
Army career, I had never actually called cadence or given marching commands so I was
not anxious to try it for the first time with our entire platoon. We were supposed to march
around the perimeter of our assembly area and end up where we started. I took my place
in front of our platoon, called ATTENTION, then LEFT FACE and then FORWARD
MARCH so far so good. Unfortunately, I talk quickly and that translated into calling
cadence much too quickly. My LEFT . RIGHT was more like
LEFTRIGHTLEFTRIGHT and the platoon became helplessly out of step. I started
hearing ECKHART GET THOSE MEN IN STEP!! from the First Sergeant and the
men in the ranks started whispering SLOW DOWN between their giggles.

As I was struggling with the cadence, the first turn was coming up and I knew I
would have to give a two-part command to turn the corner, with the second part given on
the correct foot. Unfortunately, I didnt know which foot was the correct one. It seemed
so natural when others were giving the commands and I never gave it much thought but I
did vaguely recall something about the correct foot requirement from basic training. Our
assembly was a large parking lot with curbs around its boundaries and past the curbs were
tree covered grassy mounds. I gave the first part of the command, COLUMN RIGHT a
little late and was trying to determine the correct foot for the second part of the command
when the first rank stepped over the curb. When I finally called the second part of the
command, MARCH, we were well into the trees with a lot of laughing and cursing from
the ranks. We continued through the trees until I called a HALF RIGHT MARCH
and then a HALF LEFT MARCH to get everyone back into the parking lot. At that
point, I didnt care what foot I called the command on; I just wanted to get out of the
trees. Everyone was out of step anyway. I finally got the platoon back to our approximate
starting place and, with a great deal of relief, gave the PLATOON HALT command.
Some were still laughing but the XO just shook his head in disgust and dismissed us.
There were a number of Viet Namese students at Ft. Eustis. We would often see them
walking around in their blue uniforms and they always smiled and nodded when they
approached a US Soldier. They appeared eager to be friends but our response was
typically to mutter an obscenity and turn our back on them. They didnt speak English
and we certainly didnt speak Vietnamese so we had no real interaction with them nor did
we want any. The common feeling among the U.S. troops, encouraged by our instructors
war stories and the stories from basic training, was that the ARVNs were cowards so we
had no desire to befriend them.

Figure 1: ARVN students at Ft. Eustis

I had my first experience with Marijuana while in AIT. We received short leave, I
think it might have been for Thanksgiving, and when the leave was over, I drove my car
back to Ft. Eustis. As a student, I received a temporary parking permit that I put on the
dash so it could be seen by the gate guards through the front windshield. One weekend,
Randy told me he had made a local contact and asked if I would drive him to a nearby
college where he was going to buy some grass. I agreed and later that evening, Randy,
Chip, Martin and I drove to the college. It was dark when we arrived and I had to drive
around the campus a bit before Randy found the right address. Randy made his contact
and came back to the car with a matchbox full of marijuana. It had cost $5 and, naturally,
Randy asked us to chip in. As I drove back to the base, Randy rolled a joint and started
passing it around. I watched how the others were smoking it and tried to imitate the way
they were sucking on the joint it wasnt like puffing on a cigarette, it was more like
combining the puff and the inhalation in one motion. I really didnt understand it but I

assumed the potency would somehow diminish if one puffed and then inhaled. Obviously,
Randy knew what he was doing so I did my best to imitate his technique. The joints
Randy rolled were about an eighth of an inch thick so they burned pretty quickly with a lot
of popping and sparks as the marijuana seeds exploded.
Randy asked if I would drive around awhile as he rolled a couple more joints. He
also insisted we keep the windows up. I finally started to feel the effects of the marijuana
with the last joint but it wasnt dramatic. I suspected the feeling I had may have been
from hyperventilating rather than anything from the grass but still, it was pleasant and we
were laughing and having a good time. Maybe this was the fun the recruiter had
promised. Before returning to Ft. Eustis, Randy discovered that the matchbox, which was
now about half full, would fit nicely in my 8-track cassette player mounted on the console
under the dash. The cassette player had a spring-loaded door where you inserted the
cassette and the matchbox fit perfectly behind the door and was well concealed. As I
drove through the front gate at Ft. Eustis, the MP on duty waved me through as usual and I
drove to our barracks. I didnt notice it but a couple of the MPs had followed us and
pulled up behind my car when I parked. In one of those Aw Shit moments, it occurred
to me that the car was full of marijuana smoke and the MP would clearly see, let alone
smell what we had been doing. Hoping for the best, I opened the drivers door and, in a
cloud of marijuana smoke, climbed out to face the approaching MP. As casually as I
could, I smiled and said, Hi! The MP grinned, shined his light in the car at my wideeyed friends and then in my windshield where the temporary base permit was located. He
looked back at me and said, I didnt see your permit when you came through the gate. I
see you have a student permit so everythings o.k. Still grinning, he walked back to his
car, got in and drove off.
Near the end of our 11 week course, the top three in the class were called to a meeting
with a warrant officer. The purpose of the meeting was to invite us to go to warrant
officer flight school and he explained how great life would be for us if we agreed to
extend our enlistment for an additional year, which was required before we could go to the
school. The idea of piloting a helicopter rather than working on one did appeal to me,
especially after my short time at the controls of the Cessna. I was seriously considering
signing up, but when I asked if we would still have the additional year commitment if we
failed the school, his mood changed noticeably. The answer was yes, we would still have
the commitment, but his interest in me evaporated. The unspoken message I received was
they didnt want a defeatist in their school I obviously wasnt warrant officer material
after all and even though I said I was interested, I never heard anything more about it.
AIT finally came to an end and everyone in our class, except the one married class
member received orders for Viet Nam after a fifteen day leave. (The married guy had
signed up for another school in an effort to delay his inevitable trip to Viet Nam.) So
much for the bullshit recruiter promises. Just about everything he promised Brian and I
had turned out to be a lie but, oddly, I would have been disappointed if I hadnt received
orders for Viet Nam. I had heard so much about it during the past several months that it
would have been anticlimactic to be sent anywhere else. The friends I had made in AIT
were all going and I was glad I wasnt being left behind.

VIET NAM
The fifteen day leave passed quickly. It was nice to be home but I wasnt upset when
it was time to go to the airport.
Surprisingly, I found myself anxious to get to Viet Nam. Nearly all the drill
instructors in basic and the instructors in AIT had been Viet Nam vets and their stories
gave the impression that if you were smart and listened to what they were teaching, you
would be o.k. Their implied message was only the dumbasses who didnt listen were the
ones who were killed. Also, I wanted to see first-hand what I had heard so much about.
After going through all this training, it seemed like a wasted effort if I didnt finish the
process by going to the source.
I reported to Ft. Dix for my trip to Viet Nam and I met up with all my AIT classmates
there, except for Randy, who was a no-show. It really didnt surprise any of us Randy
wasnt there and we assumed he moved to Canada or just decided to stay home Randy
was capable of either.
I dont recall how long we were at Dix but we finally boarded a commercial plane
that took us to Oakland, Hawaii, Guam, Yokota and, finally, Bien Hoa, where we landed
on March 15, 1970. A lot of stories have been told about the heat, the smell and the buses
with wire mesh on the windows and we discovered all of that was true. We were put on
one of the buses and taken to the processing center in Long Binh where we were told to
stow our duffle bags in one of the brown, two-story barracks. I found Martin in Long
Binh and we hung-out together while waiting for our assignments.
We had traveled in our khaki uniforms and were given jungle fatigues, jungle boots,
green underwear and really goofy-looking baseball caps soon after our arrival and I was
surprised how comfortable the fatigues and boots were much more so than the stuff we
wore in the states. Things were also a little more relaxed in Long Binh and we soon
learned there was no need to worry about being picked for a work detail because
Vietnamese civilian workers were doing all the crap work. We found the mess hall and
the latrines and spent some time wondering what POTABLE written on the side of
trailer/tank meant. We discovered the tank contained water and had spigots in the back so
judging from the condition of the tank, we concluded, incorrectly, that POTABLE must
mean it was water you shouldnt drink.
We had to assemble each morning and again after lunch when assignments were
made but other than that, we just hung around hoping our names would be called soon.
The sounds and smells of the place were different than anything I had experienced. The
smells werent all bad just different. Burned diesel fuel was the most prevalent smell
mixed with a faint overturned earth smell. The most interesting sounds were at night
when you could hear automatic weapons fire and an occasional artillery round exploding
in the distance. They were far away and sporadic so they werent terrifying; they were
just loud enough to remind you that you were in a very different place.
We spent a lot of time speculating about the different areas we could be sent and I
was hoping I wouldnt be sent too far north. My friend from home was in the infantry

with the 1st Cavalry based near Phu Bai, which is near Hue and just south of the DMZ and
from his letters, I knew I didnt want to go there. Being anywhere near the DMZ sounded
bad so I was hoping I would be sent somewhere further south. Finally, Martins name and
mine were called and we were told we would be going to Phu Loi and the First Aviation
Battalion. When I heard the Phu part of the name, my first thought was, I hope thats not
a regional thing Phu Bai/Phu Loi. I soon learned Phu Loi was just north of Saigon,
which was also a little disappointing. I didnt want to go to a shithole but I also didnt
want to come all the way to Viet Nam and be stationed in a rear area. Phu Loi actually
turned out to be a pretty good compromise between the two extremes a little more of a
rear area than front, which was fine.
We caught a ride on a Huey to Phu Loi and were assigned to the battalion
Headquarters Company until they could sort out what to do with us. We didnt do much
that first week but explore the base and try to keep cool it was damned hot. Martin and I
discovered the headquarters company had an infantry group that patrolled outside the wire
(perimeter) of our base each night. As infantry assignments go, it sounded like a pretty
sweet deal. They had a nice place to sleep each day and had a relatively secure area to
patrol at night. One of the guys from the group tried to convince Martin and me to join
but we politely declined.
After a week, Martin was sent to the 205th and I was sent to the 213th which were on
opposite sides of the headquarters company. I later learned that Martin was made an
operations clerk in the 205th because of his piloting background and his obvious
intelligence.
Phu Loi was about 25 miles north of Saigon and consisted of a poorly paved 3,000
foot runway with the various units, mostly aviation, arranged around it. The whole place
was about a half-mile in diameter with the runway roughly down the middle. Encircling
the entire compound was a bunker line with bunkers, concertina wire, land mines, fugas
and guard towers. We also had a control tower at one end of the runway.

Figure 2: Phu Loi control tower.

Our company area was a large rectangle bordered on one end by the runway, one side
by the battalion headquarters company, the other side by a UH-1 company and the far end
by an open area with several scattered utility buildings. The rectangle had several
segments beginning with the flight line or parking area next to the runway with the
maintenance hangers and work area next. Across a street from the maintenance area was
the orderly room, arms room and officers area. Next was the NCO area and, finally, the
enlisted mens area, the mess hall and the EM club at the far end.

Figure 3: EM Club

The enlisted area was also a rectangle with the flight platoon hoochs on one end, the
maintenance platoon hoochs down one side, the EM club at the far end and the Mess hall
on the side opposite the maintenance platoon hoochs. A large bunker was in the middle
of the rectangle.
We referred to our living quarters as hoochs but they were actually a row of three
or four man rooms with an entry door in the front of each facing the outside, inner
common area. They had cement floors and the walls were cement blocks approximately
four feet high with wooden slats up to the ceiling. There was screening behind the slats to
allow air circulation and keep out the mosquitos. The interiors of the hoochs were
decorated however the occupants wished and ranged from spartan to pretty outrageous and
many had some sort of psychedelic flavor. Posters and Playboy centerfolds were common
(Miss May, 1969 was my favorite) as were Chianti wine bottles with candles, small
refrigerators and stereo systems. Those hoochs with the more industrious occupants also
had water tanks and running, non-potable water. Usually the water tanks were discarded
Air Force jet fuel tanks that were mounted on the roof and you had to periodically talk the
water truck driver into filling it up for you when it was empty.
We also had hooch maids who came in daily and did our laundry, shined our boots
and generally kept the hooches neat and tidy. Electric fans were very popular because

there was no air conditioning except for a few rare individuals who had permanent night
jobs and had to sleep during the day, like the night operations clerks.
The latrines were long outhouses with two to five holes over halves of 55 gallon
drums. There was a horizontal door in the back where a Vietnamese civilian worker
would drag out the drums, pour on some JP4 (jet fuel, similar to kerosene) and set them on
fire. The latrines were scattered throughout the company area and the shit was burned
each day. In training, we were always told that punishment for minor offences in Viet Nam
was to be put on shit-burning detail so; luckily, we had a civilian to do that for us. You
quickly learned to wait awhile after the shit-burner did his work before you used the
latrine because the hot, steaming fumes from the JP4 could be pretty unpleasant.
There were also urinals located throughout the company area. They were perforated
55 gallon drums buried so the top was flush with the ground. A wire mesh cover was then
placed on top and a half-wall enclosure with a roof built around it. These were fine until
the rainy season when they overflowed and you had to walk through a mixture of piss and
water to get to them. Most guys just used the ditch next to the road when it was really
wet.
The mess hall was also pretty nice. We had Vietnamese civilians to do the KP duty so
that was something else we didnt have to bother with. For breakfast, we normally had
fresh eggs any way you liked them, sausage, bacon, pancakes, oatmeal, cereal and fruit
with coffee, milk and juice. Lunch and dinner were also very good and included desert.
There was a large ice machine next to the mess hall where the crew chiefs loaded their
water jugs with ice and water and we occasionally put in a couple of apples and oranges in
the cold water to snack on while we flew.
The maintenance and non-flying personnel ate lunch in the mess hall and normally
had some time to go back to their hooch to nap or relax for a while before going back to
work. The flying crews would visit mess halls wherever they were working, if there were
any, or they would just park the helicopter and have C Rations.
All in all, I discovered it was a pretty sweet way to fight a war.
I was assigned to the hooch within the maintenance platoon section and my hooch
mates were Josh Baldwin, who had arrived a day before me and John Bartowski who had
been in country for some time. Bartowski had the back half of the hooch and Josh and I
shared the front half. The standard tour of duty in Viet Nam for enlisted men was one year
but you could extend your tour if you wished. Draftees often extended their tours to get
an early discharge or early out because, apparently, the Army didnt want to go to the
trouble of relocating a soldier back to a stateside duty station if they only had a few
months left. Before going home, most of the guys sold the stuff they had accumulated
during their year so Josh and I quickly acquired fans, radios, cameras, a small refrigerator
and a reel-to-reel tape player.
Josh and I became good friends quickly and worked in the same maintenance crew so
we were together most of the time during our first couple of months in-country. Josh was
a tall sandy-haired guy from Pittsburg and had left behind a girlfriend and a Corvette when

he enlisted. Joshs signature comment was, Is that right? which he said often. He was a
deceptively bright guy, however, and an easy guy to like.
There was a stigma attached to being a newly arrived person in Viet Nam. You were
referred to derisively as a Cherry or FNG (fucking new guy) and you were made to
feel, at every opportunity that you didnt know some sort of secret that only the old timers
knew. Your untanned skin and bright green, unfaded fatigues made you an easy target for
harassment but that only lasted for a few weeks and friendships were made pretty quickly.
Bartowski, our roommate, was on his second tour and we quickly learned that he was
engaged to our hooch maid. She was pretty but Josh and I found it a little strange and
awkward. We had to be careful with the gook references around Bartowski and his
fianc and I always felt like I was invading their privacy. The hooch maids came into the
base around 7 in the morning and left around 5 in the afternoon and if we came back to
our hooch at lunch to rest or listen to music, Bartowski and his girl would frequently be in
his half of the hooch cuddling and talking softly to each other. Bartowskis half of the
hooch was nice and homey while the half Josh and I lived in was sterile and cramped,
especially with the crap we were accumulating. I didnt get the impression that Bartowski
was having sex with his fianc (though hooch maids earning a little extra cash on the side
wasnt unheard of) he seemed like the kind of guy that would be saving himself for the
wedding night. When his second tour ended, Bartowski came back to Viet Nam as a
civilian contractor, again working on Chinooks. He eventually married the hooch maid
and moved back to the states with her and her family where, I learned, they soon divorced.
It quickly became clear that my expectations of Viet Nam and the reality were quite
different. We lived in comfortable rooms with daily maid service (except for the
weirdness with Bartowski and his fianc). We had good hot food every day and the
officers and NCOs didnt give us as much crap as they did back in the states, in fact, they
seldom bothered coming into the enlisted mens area at all except to get to the mess hall.
Prostitutes were readily available (10 dollars for as long as you could make it last), the air
conditioned EM club was just a short walk away (whiskey & Coke 50 cents no ID
required) and marijuana was as easy to get as a pack of cigarettes. What more could a
young, single guy ask for and yet we still bitched and complained constantly. The contrast
between our living conditions and the fact that guys were getting killed and wounded
regularly in the bush was not lost on us, particularly those who were flying and
resupplying the troops. When something particularly good was happening to us we would
often look at each other, smile and say And what did you do in the war, Daddy?
anticipating the day we would have to face that question from our kids.
Josh and I were lucky enough to be assigned to a maintenance squad ran by the best
career NCO I met during my time in the Army. Sergeant Simmons was a marine before
joining the Army and he knew Chinooks thoroughly. He was a rare individual who was
both a nice guy and a great leader extremely rare.
Inevitably, the older guys would pass down stories to the new guys. Being an older
guy might only mean you had been in county a month longer than the newbie but
everyone took a lot of pleasure in telling stories to such a rapt audience. Normally, the

stories imparted some sort of lessen, like the story of a guy who fell asleep on bunker
guard and woke up to find Charlie had slit the throats of the other guys on his bunker
while leaving him untouched. One of the first stories we heard, and one that interested
us the most, was the last time someone in our company was killed. I heard the same story
several times with slight variations but it involved the recovery of an aircraft.

Figure 4: Maintenance crew replacing rotor blades on a Chinook

One of our helicopters was given a mission to recover a fixed-wing (fixed-wing were
airplanes while rotary-wing were helicopters). There were guys in Nam with the job of
rigging loads we would carry on the hook of our Chinook and we called them Red Hats
because they, logically, wore red baseball caps. The Red Hats would be dropped off at the
site of the disabled aircraft and would strap down the various bits that would move around
as we carried them back to the recovery area. We had been taught the Red Hats had to
place boards on top of the wings of fixed-wind aircraft, near the leading edge, to prevent
the wings from generating lift which prevented the aircraft from flying up into the
helicopter carrying it. On this occasion, the boards were not attached properly, fell off in
flight and the fixed-wing flew into the belly of the Chinook. The Chinook then crashed
and everyone on board was killed. The story was always followed by the admonition that
it was a freak accident and wasnt something that would happen again. Obviously, we all

wanted to believe the chance of us getting killed was very slim and in reality, more of us
would have probably been killed in auto accidents in the states if we hadnt been in Viet
Nam.

BUNKER GUARD

Figure 5: Phu Loi perimeter bunkers near the end of the runway.

One of the most unpleasant duties we had in the maintenance platoon was bunker
guard. Each of the units in Phu Loi was assigned a section of the base perimeter and had
to supply guards each night. The perimeter had a series of bunkers and towers with
concertina wire, claymores, fugas and, I was told, mines in front of them. The wire and
mines were continuous and the bunkers were spaced about 100 yards apart with towers of
varying height every 4th or 5th position. Each location also had a land line phone. The
bunkers in our section werent all the same but generally they were about 10 or 12 feet
square with an opening in the back and a firing slit about 10 inches wide across the front
facing away from the base. They were constructed with a wooden frame that was entirely
covered with sand bags and some also had a layer of cement over the sand bags. There
was a tall length of chain link fence in the front of each bunker to act as an RPG screen
(the rockets would hopefully hit the fence and explode before hitting the bunker).
Only the maintenance platoon had to supply bunker guards (the flight platoon was
exempt from this duty) and we would be selected every few weeks. When selected, we
would put on our flak vests, steel pots, web belt with canteen and ammo pouches and draw
our M-16 from the Arms Room. Each bunker was also armed with an M-60 so one person
per bunker would carry one of those as well. We would have a short formation to make
sure everyone was there and then be driven out to the bunker line. There was a dirt road
behind the bunkers and the deuce-and-a-half would drive down the road dropping off a

couple guys at each bunker. The guards would then check the claymores to make sure
they were still facing the right way and the blasting caps were installed, put the M-60 in
the firing slit, make sure there was ammo available for the M-60 and finally, attach the
clackers to the wires leading to the claymores. We would then climb on top of the
bunker and settle-in behind a small wall of sandbags waiting for nightfall.
Except for the command bunker, where the sergeant of the guard stayed, we seldom
spent time inside the bunkers because they were damp, dark and an ideal place for rats and
snakes. I once started into a bunker to set up the M-60 when I saw the head of a cobra
silhouetted against the firing slit. I slowly backed out and took the M-60 up on top of the
bunker. Fortunately, the bunker was coated in light grey cement and I assured myself I
would be able to see the snake if it decided to crawl up and join us during the night.
When darkness fell, one of us would sleep while the other stood guard. The
sleeping/guarding rotation was negotiated in advance and it was a little easier when there
were more than two men on the bunker. Occasionally, I would be lucky enough to get
paired with someone who was a speed or amphetamine user. One guy showed me a
little glass vial with a clear liquid that he poured into a cola. He would sip from the cola
as it got dark and he would be alert the rest of the night. In my time in Viet Nam, I never
saw enemy activity, fired my weapon or even fired a flare while on bunker guard but there
were stories of VC trying to come through our wire. Our tire changer (Vietnamese hired
to change tires in the motor pool) was rumored to have been killed while trying to sneak
through one of the other sections of our perimeter.
On one occasion, I was put into one of the towers for guard duty. This tower was one
of the older ones made of wood and was only about 20 feet high (the newer ones were
steel and much higher). Guard duty in the tower was about the same as on the bunkers but
we did have a starlight scope, which wasnt available on the bunkers. This was the first
time I had seen one and it was very cool - it reminded me of a large, very heavy rifle scope
and it hummed when you turned it on. When looking into the scope, you could see quite a
lot of detail, but everything was in varying shades of green.
Late that night, our phone buzzed and the Sergeant of the Guard told me the bunker
to our left had reported gooks in the wire and wanted me to check it out with the starlight
scope. I scanned the bunker with the scope and could see the area in front of it very
clearly. I could also see the guys manning the bunker but after looking it over for a couple
of minutes, I couldnt see anything out of the ordinary. I called the Sergeant of the Guard
to make sure I was looking at the correct bunker and he confirmed that it was the right one
and asked the guys on the bunker if the gooks were still there. They were getting pretty
excited by now and started describing in some detail that the gooks were crawling under
the wire in front of their bunker. I was starting to get a little unnerved also because I was
looking through the starlight at the exact area they were describing and I still couldnt see
anything out of the ordinary. He told the guys on the bunker to calm down, the guy in the
tower next to them (me) was watching the area with a starlight scope and they should sit
tight and continue watching for movement. I asked the guy with me in the tower to look
also and we spent the rest of the night taking turns scanning the area with the starlight but

we didnt see any movement at all. We were picked up the next morning and I heard
nothing more about the gooks in the wire from that night. I assumed the guys on the
bunker were: a) on some sort of drug and they were hallucinating, b) were just
bullshitting the Sergeant of the Guard in an effort to get permission to blow their
claymores or c) there really were gooks in the wire and I just couldnt see them. If there
really were gooks in the wire, Im sure all the talking between the bunker, my tower and
the sergeants bunker convinced them to try someplace less active.
When on guard, we were taught you were supposed to say, Halt! when anyone
approached your position (bunker). When the person stopped, you then said, Who goes
there? The person approaching was then supposed to identify themselves. You were
then supposed to say, Advance and be recognized. And when they came closer, I think
you were supposed to tell them to halt again, and ask them to state their business. I dont
remember anyone doing the whole routine but we did normally do the Halt and Who
goes there parts when someone approached our bunker from the rear after dark. If they
were approaching your bunker from the front, through the concertina wire, you obviously
didnt have to be so formal. Im not sure if it was official but the understanding we had
was that if you said Halt three times and the person didnt stop, you were then permitted
to shoot them.
Later in my tour, I was given Sergeant of the Guard duty one night. In this
assignment, I took the troops out to their bunkers, drove the Officer of the Guard around
to check on everyone and then picked up everyone in the morning. I also acted as the
Officer of the Guards gofer if he needed anything.
In the middle of the night, the officer of the guard, a first lieutenant, decided to check
on everyone and had me drive him around in the jeep. I would just idle down the road
with the lights off and stop at each bunker. The officer would then get out and quietly
walk up to the bunker waiting for the Halt, who goes there? challenge. For the first few
bunkers, everything went as expected but he didnt receive a challenge from the next one.
He disappeared into the dark and in a few minutes returned with an armful of M-16s and
the M-60. As he put the weapons in the back of the jeep, he explained that everyone on
the three-man bunker was asleep so he had taken their weapons. He had me quietly back
up several hundred feet and drive back to the bunker revving the engine and making as
much noise as I could short of blowing the horn. He had a coughing fit as he walked up to
the bunker and finally received a faint, Halt, who goes there? He talked with the guard
for a few minutes as if everything was fine and then came back to the jeep. We finished
checking the remaining bunkers without incident and returned to the orderly room where I
stored the weapons. I often wondered how long it took for those guys to figure out they
were sitting on the bunker with nothing but a hand flare to shoot at any enemy who
happened by. I was very impressed with that first lieutenant.

OFF-BASE TRIPS
Though we seldom ventured away from Phu Loi except by helicopter, it was possible
to catch rides to other military bases on jeeps or trucks that were going there on military
business. On one occasion, Josh and I had a day off and, along with four or five other
guys, caught a ride on a deuce-and-a-half truck going to Long Binh. Our intent was to
visit their larger PX. One of the guys in the truck was Specialist 6 Dennis, a tech inspector
who was on his second tour and we thought it would be a good idea to follow him, since
he apparently knew where he was going. Near the Long Binh gate, our truck pulled off
the road and the driver jumped down, telling everyone we had a flat tire. The Sp 6 jumped
off the truck, with Josh and I close behind, and walked in the front door of a Vietnamese
building (actually, it was probably constructed by the French it wasnt a U.S. military
building) that turned out to be a bar. As soon as we entered, two bar girls grabbed our
arms and pulled us to one of the booths lining the front of the room while Sp 6 Dennis
continued through the bar and left out the back door. The girls were very pretty and we
had no idea where the Sp 6 was going so Josh and I were easily convinced to join them
and in excellent English the girls asked us to play gin rummy for drinks. A little bizarre,
maybe, but it sounded like fun and Josh and I were hoping we would soon be buying more
than just drinks from the girls. Josh and I ordered glasses of beer while the girls ordered
tea and dealt the cards. We played at least 10 games of gin rummy and one or the other of
the girls won every game. Josh and I were getting pretty drunk on the beer and the girls
rubbing against us didnt help our concentration but they were phenomenal card players.
The truck driver eventually finished his business and called everyone back to the truck
(there was never a flat tire). We finished our last beers, the girls gave us a smile and a
quick kiss, and we stumble back to the truck to find Sp 6 Dennis already on board.
We also went to the bars in Saigon occasionally. It was supposed to be off limits but
we would go to the orderly room and request a pass for the Saigon PX. We would then go
to the front gate and ask the MPs for anything going to Saigon and they would point out a
truck of jeep that was going in that direction. After asking for a lift (we were never turned
down) we would climb on whatever vehicle it was and head into town. Sometimes we
would actually be dropped off at the PX but we would then either walk or catch a cab to
Tudo Street, where all the bars were located. (Later in my tour, I found my favorite place
in Saigon was the Continental hotel. It had a fantastic bar and some of the most beautiful
Vietnamese girls I had seen.)

Figure 6: Catching a ride into Saigon

We always wore our nomex flight suits when going to Saigon and we normally
carried pistols in belt holsters. Josh had a .38 revolver, which was favored because of its
relatively light weight, while I had a .45 semi-auto because it was all the arms room had
left when I got there. On one occasion, we had just been dropped off near Tudo Street and
Josh wanted to change some MPC (military payment certificates) for the local currency,
Piaster. After asking around, he was offered an unusually good exchange rate and
watched as the Vietnamese money changer counted out the Piasters. The money changer
then rolled up the money and put a rubber band around it. Josh handed the guy the MPC
and just as the money changer was handing Josh the roll of piaster, another Vietnamese
guy walked between them. I didnt see the change but they had actually changed the roll
of bills the first guy had counted for another roll that didnt have anything in it under the
top bill. Josh noticed it immediately and smoothly drew his .38 and put the barrel under
the nose of the money changer. Now give me the first roll of bills, Josh said. The
second guy quickly came back with the original roll of piasters, gave it to Josh and both
rushed away into the crowd. Damn, Josh was all I could say.

Figure 7: Coming back from Saigon.

Occasionally, the CO would let everyone not on duty load into a Chinook for a day
trip to Vung Tau, an in-country R&R (Rest and Recuperation) Center. Vung Tau was on
the coast and had a pretty nice beach that was divided into a Vietnamese section and a
U.S. section (I also believe there was an Australian section further down). The
Vietnamese werent allowed into our section but we had free access to theirs where they
sold soft drinks and rented inner tubes. There were also prostitutes in the Vietnamese
section and the standard activity was to rent an inner tube and a prostitute and float out
into the surf to R&R. Im sure Vung Tau would have been better utilized by the guys
actually fighting the war but it was offered, so we took advantage of it.

Figure 8: The Vietnamese/U.S. dividing line at Vung Tau.

FLIGHT STATUS
After you were in the maintenance platoon for a while, you could volunteer to
become a Crew Chief. The Chinook crew had a pilot, a pilot in command (PIC), a Flight
Engineer, a Crew chief and a Gunner.
The PIC normally flew in the right seat and had overall command of the helicopter.
The Pilot, who flew in the left seat was normally the junior officer and shared in the duties
of flying the helicopter, navigating and talking on the radio. The Chinook didnt have an
autopilot so one of the two had to have hands on the controls all the time. During the 10
to 12 hour days occasionally flown, that could get pretty tiring.
The Flight Engineer was the senior enlisted man and in charge of the mechanical
aspects of the helicopter. The Flight Engineer would pre-flight the helicopter each
morning and assist the pilots in their pre-flight inspection answering any questions they
might have. When flying, the Flight Engineer worked in the back of the helicopter
supervising the loading and unloading of internal cargo and working the hook for external
loads. He would also keep an eye on the visible mechanicals which were mostly located
in the back. The Crew Chief was training to be a Flight Engineer and would perform tasks
as directed by the Flight Engineer. He would also assist the Flight Engineer in the preflight and generally assist with any required maintenance. Each Crew Chief was issued an
insulated water jug and it was his duty to fill it with ice and water each morning. When
flying, the Crew Chief normally manned the M-60 mounted in the right door but the Flight
Engineer and Crew Chief would regularly swap positions while flying for training and to
break up the monotony. The Crew Chief also refueled the right side of the helicopter at
refueling stops. The Gunner was responsible for the two M-60 machine guns. They
would also clean the windows and sweep up as directed by the Flight Engineer. The
Gunners were normally eleven bravo or infantry men who had volunteered or were
selected to be a helicopter gunner so they hadnt gone through the Chinook school the
Flight Engineer and Crew Chief had attended. In flight, they manned the left M-60 and
refueled the left side of the helicopter whenever we stopped for fuel. The gunners day
could be incredibly boring.

Figure 9: Refueling station. JP4 was in the large rubber bladder.

Each member of the crew was required to carry a personal weapon, M-16s for the
gunner and Crew Chief and pistols (38 or 45 caliber) for the pilots and Flight Engineer.
Each person in the crew wore nomex uniforms, which were fire resistant (not fire proof),
nomex and leather gloves and a helmet. The helmet had built-in headphones and a
microphone with a microphone cord coming out the side that would be plugged into the
helicopters intercom system. There was a mic button at the plug that was pressed when
you wanted to talk. The intercom would click when you pressed the mic button and it was
common practice to acknowledge someones instructions or comments just by clicking the
button twice, click, click.
Though not worn all the time, the helicopters were equipped with personal armor we
called Chicken Plates. Unlike the flak vests used by the guys on the ground, the chicken
plates had rigid, contoured plates covering the front and back of the torso. The plates
were about an inch thick and were held in place by straps and Velcro. They were very
heavy and restricted movement so they normally werent worn by the enlisted crew but we
would put them on if we thought we were going into an area with known enemy activity.
The chicken plates also felt like you were wearing an overcoat so it was almost
impossible to work while wearing them when we werent at altitude because the
temperature and humidity at ground level were often in the 90s. The pilots wore the
chicken plates more frequently and they also had a lot of armor plate around their seats
and around the flight assist systems behind their seats.
One of the great things about flying was the relief from the high heat and humidity on
the ground. We seldom, if ever, flew above 10,000 feet but the higher we flew, the cooler
it became. Air blew through the cargo area of the helicopter freely so that gave an added
cooling effect.
There were several reasons to volunteer to become a crewman. First was the
additional flight pay. As a Specialist 4, my monthly base pay was $231.60. Foreign duty
pay, for being in Viet Nam, added another $13 but flight pay added an additional $65!

 Flight platoon personnel were also exempt from bunker guard duty. I understood the
infantry soldiers considered bunker duty as down time but for us, giving up our soft
beds and trying to stay awake a few hours at night was a major inconvenience. The
maintenance platoon could also become pretty boring, doing the same maintenance
routines day after day in the hot sun. Maintenance was interesting at first but after doing it
several times, it was like a job. The biggest reason, however, was that flying was
exciting! Taking off each morning for who-knew-what adventures sounded more like
what I expected from the war. The Nomex flight uniforms were also very sharp much
classier than the fatigues everyone else wore.
Josh and I volunteer for flight duty and joined the flight platoon after two months.
Since we were at the same level, we seldom flew together and we stopped seeing each
other so often. We moved into the flight platoon area and Josh became more of a head
while I tended more toward the boozer group.

FIRST FLYING EXPERIENCES

It was the practice then to permanently assign a crew to a helicopter. That really
didnt mean much in practice because the challenge of scheduling so many helicopters
required people to be assigned wherever they were needed. A helicopter would not be left
idle because a crewmember was on R&R or sick call but whenever possible, the assigned
crew would be in their helicopter. My first assignment as a Crew Chief was to a
helicopter with a Flight Engineer named Dave. I hadnt met Dave but before my first
flight, another more experienced Crew Chief looked me up and said he had noticed I was
scheduled to fly with Dave that day (flight crew assignments were posted in the operations
room each evening). I just wanted to tell you to keep an eye on that son-of-a-bitch. I
dont want to get into the details, but just be careful. I had no idea what he was talking
about but I thanked him for the heads-up. I knew Dave was in his second or third full tour
and I also knew he was a head but I knew little else. To my knowledge, he had few
friends and generally stayed in his hooch when he wasnt flying.
Before my first flight, I was supposed to be issued a helmet, Nomex uniforms, gloves
and water jug but supply was out of helmets. I asked around and my friend Martin, from
AIT, gave me a very old helmet from the 205th with a hand painted picture of an Indian on
the back (their call sign was Geronimo). The first time I flew, I discovered the
microphone on my old helmet was messed up and I could barely be heard over the loud
squeals that started every time I pressed the mic button. Dave quickly told me to shut up
and just sit at the right gun. After a few days, I received a helmet from a guy who was
rotating home so I could start participating more in the work we were doing. I also
noticed Dave was normally a really nice guy in the morning but turned into a real asshole
before lunch. After lunch, he was again a nice guy but before we quit for the day, he
would turn into an asshole again. Someone finally told me Dave was a heavy heroin user,
which explained his mood swings.
The cargo we carried on the hook was referred to as sling loads. We carried all sorts
of material in sling loads; other aircraft, ammunition, cannons, fuel blivets, jeeps, trucks,
armored personnel carriers and, on one occasion, soda bottles. If it could be placed in
nylon nets or attached to a nylon donut, we could probably transport it. We had weight
limits, of course, but it was amazing what we could pick up.

Figure10: Carrying a Huey

The cargo hook was a large hydraulically operated steel hook mounted on a curved Ibeam in a square hole in the middle of the helicopter floor. The hook was opened and the
load released by pressing a button on the pickle grip held by the crewman or by a button
in the cockpit. If hydraulic pressure was lost, the hook could be opened manually by
pulling on a D ring attached to a steal cable and mounted on top of the hook assembly.
To hook up a sling load, the person working the hole would talk the pilot to the point
where the rigger on the ground could slam the nylon donut into the hook. The instructions
would be something like, Forward 5, left 3 . . forward 2, right 1 . . youre hooked.
If there was a lot of wind or if the pilot wasnt particularly good at controlling the
helicopter, the process could take some time as we wandered around over the rigger
holding the donut.
Some of the pilots seemed to take pride in being able to hook a load with very little
input from the crewman. They would hover so low over the load that the crewman
operating the hook couldnt see the load and the rigger until they were directly under the
hook. Sometimes, it worked perfectly and all I had to say was, Were hooked but the
pilot often misjudged the height and the rigger would be confined between the bottom of
the Chinook and the top of the load. I dont think we actually hurt any of the riggers but
we did knock a few off their loads and I thought those pilots were idiots. Standing on top
of load while a giant wind machine descended on you had to be unnerving but being

squeezed down on top of the load had to be terrifying. .

As the helicopter started to rise after the load was attached, unless it was obvious, the
crewman might also call straps tight when the load was ready to be lifted. Upon arrival
at the destination, the crewman in the hole would call 50 feet when the load was
approximately that distance from the ground. He would then call increments of 10 or 20
feet, depending on how quickly the helicopter was descending, until the load was on the
ground. The crewman would then open the hook, call load released and we would go to
the next job.

Figure 11: Rigger preparing to connect a load to our Chinook.

Internally, the Chinook could carry 33 fully equipped US troops (referred to as

PAX not sure why) or 66 Vietnamese we packed the Vietnamese in pretty tightly.
We could also carry a jeep and small trailer internally and anything else that could be
carried on board like C rations, soft drinks, beer, laundry or anything the guys in the field

needed. On a couple of occasions, we also transported body bags from the field but that
was rare.

Figure 12: Delivering laundry.

Artillery pieces were occasionally rigged with a strap from the donut to the cannon
and another strap from the cannon to the ammunition. One day, early in my flying
experience and just before lunch, we picked up a 105mm cannon with ammo slung under
it. I was on the right gun and Dave was working the hole. We were taught in AIT that on
this type of load, the person on the right gun should call the distance of the ammo to the
ground and when the lower load was on the ground, the person working the hook would
take over and call the cannon to the ground, making sure it wasnt placed on top of the
ammo. It was initially difficult for me to judge distances - the first time I tried it, I called
50 feet and the pilot responded with, Ah, you might want to check that chief, its more
like 500. Chuckle, chuckle. On this occasion, I was hanging out the door watching the
load as we descended and I knew what I was supposed to do but I had never done it before

and didnt know if it was one of those many things taught in school but never used in
practice. I thought Dave would give me some indication if he wanted me to actually try to
call the first load so I said nothing and watched the first load hit the dirt. Dave then called
the second load and when it was unhooked, started giving me all kinds of hell for not
calling the first load down. Since it was on the intercom, everyone in the helicopter could
hear Dave describe what kind of incompetent asshole I truly was.

Figure 13: Artillery piece delivered.

We had a mission to pick up a large steel box, called a CONEX, from a small base on
top of a hill. The box was big and, I believe, used as a communications shed. Dave was
working the hole when we hooked up to the box. It was the dry season and as we started
to lift, the rotor wash threw up a dust cloud so thick the pilots couldnt see the ground.
The sudden lack of visual reference apparently surprised the pilots and they told Dave to
release the load when it was 10 or 15 feet off the ground. Dave responded with, Negative
there are ground troops below us. I was impressed. The pilots were freaking out and
Dave was essentially telling them to suck it up and do their jobs. Dave was a bastard and
a drug addict but he was a damned good at being a Flight Engineer.
We were flying along one day with me on the right gun and Dave in the back (Dave

seldom let me work in the back). I was sitting there at the gun watching the clouds go by
when the gunner tapped me on the arm. I looked at the gunner and he grinned and nodded
his head towards the back of the helicopter. I looked around and saw Dave sitting next to
the hole with his sleeve pulled up and a needle in his arm. I was amazed he had the balls
to shoot-up while we were flying. It was very difficult for the pilots to see anything in the
back so it wasnt likely they would see him but I was a little freaked out. He was the only
person I had ever known or would know who was a needle using heroin addict.
Despite having to fly with a drug addict, I loved to fly! The Chinooks had large
opening on both sides, the square hole in the middle of the floor and the opening in the
rear above the ramp and we never wore seatbelts or any sort of tether. The freedom of
movement coupled with the unobstructed views of the ground and the clouds gave a sense
of flying that doesnt exist in normal, enclosed airplanes.
One of my favorite parts of flying was low-level flight when we would fly just over
the tree tops at well over 100 mph following the contours of the ground and the jungle.
The reasoning for flying so low was to avoid ground fire because we would be past any
enemy troops before they had a chance to aim and shoot. But it was also just fun.
The Chinooks also had an incredible rate of climb and we would occasionally drop
off a load and depart vertically, going from ground level straight up to altitude in minutes.
There was a standard maneuver called autorotation which is the way helicopters
land when they lose power. To begin the maneuver, the helicopter enters a steep descent,
almost to the point of freefall with just enough pitch in the blades to keep them rotating.
As the helicopter nears the ground, the pitch in the blades would be quickly increased and
the resulting drag would slow the decent dramatically. If performed correctly, the
helicopter would then gently land. The pilots practiced this maneuver frequently and it
was always part of the check ride for newly arrived pilots. For the crew, it was a rush!
The sudden drop definitely made your pulse quicken and during the decent, you almost
felt weightless.

DRUGS
As noted earlier, the enlisted men were generally either heads or boozers. There
were, of course, many who were neither but I found them less noticeable and generally
more mature.
There was a lot of marijuana in Viet Nam. At Ft. Eustis, $5 bought a matchbox of
grass with a lot of seeds and stems but in Viet Nam, $5 bought a full sandwich baggie of
very good marijuana. Quite a few of the guys were dedicated pot smokers and they could
roll some very big, impressive joints.
The PX sold Ritz crackers in a round tin box and a lot of the guys would often store
their grass in a Ritz cracker can that was kept out in the open. We had shakedown
inspections periodically where the NCOs would be made to rummage through our hoochs
looking for anything we shouldnt have. If the marijuana in the Ritz can was ever
discovered, everyone could claim ignorance and it would be hard for anyone to be accused
of owning the grass at least that was the theory. You could even say it was left over
from a previous tenant who had gone home. I witnessed a couple of these inspections
where the Ritz cracker can, sitting in the open, was noticeably ignored.
All of the heads smoked grass, a few did speed and occasionally, someone would
receive a letter from a friend at home containing some LSD. There were also various pills
that were acquired, often from someone, who knew someone that was a medic. Grass,
acid and speed were looked upon as hippie, happy, peace and love type of drugs while
heroin was a ghetto, life killing drug. I knew of no one except Dave, who used, or wanted
to use heroin. Most of the drugs were one-time, take it or leave it things but heroin was
seriously dangerous. Our understanding, at the time, was that cocaine was not habit
forming so it was thought to be in the marijuana/speed/LSD category good to get high
but not addictive. Someone introduced some white powder and said it was cocaine so
several of the guys started snorting it. It became more and more popular and there were a
number of guys I knew who were using it pretty regularly and treating it much like they
did marijuana.
One day, we were all required to attend a drug abuse training session (the only one I
attended while in Viet Nam) given by an Army doctor. He reviewed the various types of
drugs available in Viet Nam and when he got to cocaine, he explained that it was only
produced in South America. He then asked, Do you guys really think these gooks are
importing cocaine all the way from South America for your pleasure? What you have
been snorting is heroin. He then explained that the quality of the heroin in Viet Nam was
very good and much more pure than anything that could be purchased in the States. He
told us our company had one of the highest drug abuse rates in Viet Nam. Im not sure
how he knew we were the worst but I certainly believed it was true. It also confirmed for
many, their belief that the Army had CID (Criminal Investigation Command) undercover
agents within our ranks. I couldnt imagine any other unit doing more drugs than I had
seen being used and still function. On the other hand, Dave was a serious heroin user and
he was actually doing a pretty good job.

After the doctors presentation, most of the guys I knew who were snorting the
cocaine were really rattled and swore they would stop. Unfortunately, a few couldnt
and I knew at least one guy who later overdosed and was taken to the dispensary just in
time to save his life. It was sad to see what some of those guys were going through and
even worse when they swore they werent addicted. One good friend came to my hooch,
clearly high, and wanted to talk. I told him, You need to stop using that shit. Youre
going home soon and you dont want to take the habit with you. Nah, nah man, I dont
use that stuff anymore but his eyelids were drooping and he could barely stay on the jerry
can he was sitting on. Again, we were a bunch of guys in our late teens, most fresh out of
high school, making decisions that had very serious consequences and we only had each
other to rely on for guidance.
I felt the widespread drug use in our unit could have been controlled if the officers
who were in charge of us were more competent. If an Army doctor could tell us our
company had the highest rate of drug abuse in the country, you would think the
commanding officer (CO) of the company would want to do something to change that, but
I saw no evidence of any sort of anti-drug effort. The CO served only a six month tour, so
we had three during my time there. They just wanted to get their combat experience and
maybe a few medals to help them with their next promotion. The CO in place when I
arrive was a Major that I met once, the second was a Captain I never met and the third was
a Major who I met when he looked me up in front of the hanger one day to give me a reup talk after which he reprimanded me for my moustache extending beyond the corners
of my mouth. They focused on inconsequential crap while drugs were flowing freely all
around them.
The officers and NCOs were rarely seen in the enlisted mens area; they had their
own areas with the NCO club in the NCO section and the Officers club in the officers
section. Even the mess hall was segregated by enlisted, NCO and Officer. I was lucky
enough to avoid the cocaine/heroin tragedy because I would only smoke an occasional
joint with most of my recreational drug use being whiskey-and-coke but I had a number of
friends who werent as lucky. Its hard to believe our company functioned as well as it did
with all the drug use but the heavy users, like Dave, could self-regulate their drug intake to
remain productive during the day. The ones who couldnt control it were just shuffled off
to less consequential work.

RECOVERING AIRCRAFT
Each Chinook carried a recovery strap which was a length of layered nylon strap
about twenty feet long with a nylon donut on the end. We never allowed metal rings or
chains to be connected to the hook because, we were told, the metal to metal contact
would quickly destroy the hook. Everything we carried was connected using nylon
straps. The recovery strap was used when we couldnt get close enough to the load for the
ground personnel to connect us so we would connect one end of the recovery strap to our
hook and drop the other end to the ground personnel below who would connect it to the
load. It was most often used to recover other aircraft that had landed or crashed in the
jungle.
We had one mission to pick up an A-1E aircraft which was a World War II style
propeller driven fighter airplane used in Viet Nam. We hooked onto it at the end of a
small runway lined by other small fixed wing aircraft. You could tell the A-1E was very
heavy by the way the Chinook strained to get it into the air. I was on the right gun and
when it was finally off the ground we hovered down the runway to gather speed to
generate lift. As we did so, our rotor wash spun each of the smaller parked planes into
each other and I was surprised at the amount of damage we were apparently doing. I was
also surprised the small planes hadnt been tied down when they were parked which was
standard practice with our Chinooks. We finally got some altitude and I was watching our
shadow on the ground as we flew along with the aircraft below us. Suddenly, our
helicopter jumped violently and I saw the shadow of the A-1E slowly nose over and dive
to the ground. I looked back at Dave and he was just sitting there looking down at the
recovery strap that had broken near the A-1E and recoiled up into our helicopter. If Dave
had his head further out over the hook, it probably would have given him a serious injury.
The pilots returned to hovered over the A-1E to assess the damage but all you could see
was a short piece of the tail section sticking up out of the ground. In that one short
mission, we had destroyed the A-1E and caused unknown damage to a lot of smaller
aircraft but as we said so often in Viet Nam, Fuck it, dont mean nothin.
I was working the hole one day when we were sent to recover a Huey that had force
landed in the jungle. As we hovered over the Huey, I hooked up the recovery strap and
dropped the free end to Red Hat below. As he was reaching for the strap, he suddenly fell
or jumped from the Huey and our helicopter turned abruptly and started gaining altitude.
The pilots told us the Red Hats started receiving fire and we would be called back when
they had cleared the area. I wasnt sure if the Red Hat had jumped or had been shot off
the Huey but my admiration for those guys increased tremendously.

RECEIVING FIRE
The first and only time I was shot at was during a mission on a very cloudy, rainy
day. I was on the right gun, as usual, watching the world go by and listening to the pilot
talk to the guys on the ground. The PIC, who was in the right seat directly in front of me
on the other side of the armor plating, was flying the helicopter and we had a load on the
hook.

Figure14: Manning the right M-60 machine gun.

On this day, the cloud cover was solid at about 1,000 feet. The guys on the ground
said they thought they heard us but couldnt see us so we would periodically drop down
below the clouds in an effort to see the base and hope they would spot us. Once, when
dropping down, I heard a series of pops and could see green tracers coming from the right
and going below and in front of the nose of our Chinook. I looked down and further to
our rear and could see a large clear field of what appeared to be brown grass with one
small green bush in the middle the tracers were coming out of the bush. My first thought
was, What a dumbass. We practiced shooting our M-60 quite often and I was sure I
could saturate that bush if only I had put a longer chain of ammo in my gun. I had
become so complacent that I had been putting only a very short length of ammo, about 10

rounds, in the M-60 machine gun a longer chain tended to get tangled and there really
wasnt any place to put the bullets except on the floor. When I fired the M-60, I never
aimed it by sighting down the barrel; rather, I would watch the tracer rounds and adjust the
aim until the tracers were hitting the target with only ten rounds loaded, I was sure I
couldnt adjust my fire quickly enough to hit the bush. I clicked the mic and said, Were
receiving fire, three oclock and swung my gun around to fire off my short length of
ammo when I heard a click, click over the intercom and we immediately pulled up into
the clouds. I hadnt fired a shot.
When we stopped for lunch, the pilot came out of the cockpit and said, Did I hear
someone say we were receiving fire? I told him yes and he asked, Why didnt you shoot
back? I said something like, I didnt receive clearance to return fire which was a little
weak but I couldnt tell him my gun wasnt properly loaded. He proceeded to raise hell
with me saying something to the effect that if we were ever shot at again I shouldnt wait
for someone to tell me to shoot back. From then on, I kept a very long chain of ammo in
the gun and never used it.
My reply about receiving clearance to return fire did have some merit. We were
always being told when there was a free fire zone or when we shouldnt use our weapons
because there were friendlies in the area so it was prudent not to start blazing away with
the M-60 until someone said it was o.k. I knew that any time I was shot at, though, I
really should have shot back.

ROCKETS
We received rocket fire at our base every couple of months and it normally occurred
at night, early in the evening or before sun-up. We would get two or three rounds in close
proximity and that was it. Sirens would blow and we would go on red alert, which meant
the Ready Reserve had to get their gear and assemble for instructions. Everyone else
was supposed to go to the nearest bunker. We had a huge bunker in the common area in
front of our hooch line where we were supposed to assemble.

Figure 15; Hooch line with bunker on the left.

My first experience with a rocket attack came shortly after I arrived in country and
was living in the hooch with Josh and Bartowski. I was in the top bunk and Josh was in
the bottom. The Charge of Quarters (CQ) had just knocked on our door to wake us up
when there was a very loud explosion and the clattering sound of gravel on our corrugated
steel roof. I immediately rolled off my bunk and fell to the floor, then rolled under the
bottom bunk to find Josh already there. There were a couple more explosions, a little
farther away but still pretty damn close. After a bit, we slowly got up to check on
Bartowski, who was in the back half of our hooch and closer to the explosion. Bartowski
was fine and we learned the rocket had landed in the headquarters company next to ours
and almost directly behind our hooch. Josh and I walked over to look at the impact crater
and were surprised to see that it was so insignificant. It looked as though someone had
just brushed away the dirt and there wasnt really a crater at all.
For the remainder of my tour, rocket hits were never as close as that first one and we

would ignore them if they werent in our area. Sometimes, however, one of the NCOs
would walk down the hooch line making everyone get out of bed and go to the bunker
where we had to stay until the all clear siren sounded. On one occasion, after being
herded into the bunker, someone lit up a joint and you could smell the marijuana smoke
drifting through the dark, cramped space. There were no lights in the bunker and
normally, that wouldnt have been a big deal but the guy with the joint didnt realize the
CO was in the area and had come into the bunker also. When the CO smelled the smoke,
he went ballistic and demanded to know, WHO IS SMOKING MARIJUANA? I WANT
THAT PERSON TO COME FORWARD IMMEDIATELY! There were a few giggles
but obviously, no one did anything and the CO finally stormed out when the all clear
signal sounded.
One of the more memorable rocket events occurred later in my tour when I was in the
flight platoon. I was in a hooch with three other guys, one of whom had obtained an AK47 with a banana clip full of ammo that he kept hidden behind a locker at the foot of his
bunk. That was during the Cambodian invasion when we were hauling all kinds of stuff
out of Cambodia and my friend had an opportunity to pick up the AK-47. We werent
allowed to keep weapons in our hooch so having the AK was definitely against the rules
and only the guys in our hooch knew about it. We were getting ready to go to bed when
the rockets hit on the other side of the base. Since the rockets were so far away, we turned
out the lights and went to bed as we normally did but just as we settled in, we heard M-16
fire coming from the NCO area, which was pretty close behind the flight platoons hooch
line. It was easy to imagine our worst fears had come true and the VC had slipped through
the wire before the rockets but we couldnt understand why they would be firing an M-16.
We got up, left the lights off and starting talking about our options. The M-16 fire was
sporadic but it continued coming closer to our area. There should have been a company
area guard around who would also be armed but who knew where the hell he was and he
was probably stoned anyway.
The arms room was in the NCO area, so we concluded that the VC must have come
through the wire, broken into the arms room and stolen an M-16. Clearly, that was a
stretch but we couldnt think of any other possible reason why there would be just the one
M-16 firing with no one firing back. The owner of our AK-47 pulled it out from behind
his locker and unwrapped it but we decided that actually using it would be the last resort.
Good guys using an AK-47 against bad guys using an M-16 sounded like a situation that
couldnt end well for any of us. The M-16 firing continued and we could now hear it had
reached the end our hooch line so we opened the door and the four of us peaked out, one
head on top of the other. The first thing we saw was one of the Ready Reserve running
towards that end of the hooch line when there was a short burst and the guy fell flat on his
face into a puddle of mud in front of our hooch (it was the rainy season). It certainly
looked like he had been shot and my friend was getting his AK-47 ready. There was a lot
of shouting near the source of the M-16 fire and we soon realized it wasnt VC but one of
our maintenance platoon NCOs firing an M-16 into the air. We could then hear him
shouting, GET INTO THE GODDAM BUNKER YOU MUTHERFUKERS. RED
ALERT, RED ALERT! He was obviously very drunk but determined to get everyone

into the bunker, where they should be. One of the senior maintenance guys realized what
was happening and came out of this hooch, walked over to the NCO and grabbed the rifle
out of his hands which I thought was one of the bravest things I had ever seen. I thought
he was going to butt stroke the NCO but he just cleared the weapon and walked it back to
the arms room. The guy in the puddle slowly got up and retrieved his steel pot while the
rest of us tried to calm down. The AK-47 was cleared, rewrapped and again stowed
behind the locker. The NCO received an Article 15 for that night but Im sure he never
knew how close he came to starting a fire fight with my roommate and his AK-47.

Figure 16: Part of our flight line showing Chinooks parked within revetments.

I was assigned to guard the flight line one night and there were rumors that sappers
might come through the wire and put satchel charges into our Chinooks so I was a little
more alert than normal. There were always rumors like that floating around and they
were never true but there was always that nagging feeling that this time, they may be
right. I was given a PRC 25 radio and a pump shotgun, neither of which I had ever used
before, and sent out to the flight line. I walked around for a couple hours carrying the
radio and the shotgun and decided to sit down against one of the revetments and have a
cigarette. As I was sitting there fiddling with the radio, there were three rocket blasts on
the other side of the runway, quite a distance away. The sirens went off and I got up to
walk around some more maybe this time the rumors were accurate. If anyone had tried
to call me on the radio, they were out of luck because I couldnt get it to work. The
batteries may have been dead or I might have turned the wrong knob so I just leaned it
against one of the revetments and continued walking around the Chinooks with the

shotgun. I had a pretty good idea how to operate the shotgun so I loaded it but didnt
chamber a round. As I was walking around, one of the AC130 gunships opened up with
their mini guns just outside our base. It was the first time I had seen a mini gun fire and it
was very impressive. The tracers were so close together that it looked like a wavy red line
from the darkness in the air to the ground. It was pretty far away but I could hear the
rrrrrrrrrrr right after seeing the red line of tracers very cool. I continued looking
around until the sergeant of the guard came out with my replacement. Luckily, the sapper
rumor proved to be the normal bullshit.

STANDBY
We had several versions of standby status. One was for the fire buckets, one was
night standby and one was simply nothing to do right now but standby in case something
comes up. All three required that you go to your helicopter, pre-flight it and wait for the
pilots to show up with something to do.
The fire-buckets were two large fiberglass buckets attached side by side with
hydraulically operated doors on the bottom. They were slung below the Chinook on a
long strap and were used, obviously, to put out fires. When assigned to the fire buckets,
the pilots would taxi the aircraft down to the end of the flight line where the fire buckets
were kept and wait for the crew to connect the buckets to the hook and plug in the
hydraulics that opened the doors on the bottom. It was then standard procedure to test
the buckets by flying to a nearby river, dipping the buckets to fill them and then find a
busy highway with a likely Vietnamese on a motorbike. We would then approach the
motorbike from the rear and guided by the Flight Engineer, maneuver into position where
the FE would open the buckets and douse the Vietnamese. My one experience with the
fire buckets required two trips to the river before we hit our target. If the Viet Cong had
recruiting posters, Im sure one of them would have a picture of a Chinook with fire
buckets chasing an innocent civilian.
I never actually tried to put out a fire with the fire buckets but I had a good friend
who flew a night mission to put out a burning ammo dump. He was hit in the wrist with
shrapnel while hovering over the fire and was only one of three people in our Company
that I knew had received a purple heart. On another occasion, our USO club caught on
fire, which was about 100 yards from the back of our hooch. The fire buckets were called
to put out that fire but arrived so late that the roof had already collapsed and all the fire
buckets did was blow over the block walls with the helicopters rotor wash.
Night standby was generally more serious and we normally werent called out unless
it was something important. My most memorable night standby mission, however, was
after the offices had a party at the officers club. They had invited some nurses from Long
Binh to their party and one of the nurses apparently had to get back that night. Two
captains decided to use the night standby to take the nurse home and I was unfortunate
enough to have the duty that night. As we were doing the preflight, I could tell both the
pilots had been drinking and I wasnt anxious to fly at night with two drunks in the
cockpit. My unscientific belief was that commissioned officers were normally the poorest
pilots because they were officers first who happened to go to flight school. The warrant
officers, on the other hand were just pilots. Thats all they did and most of them were
pretty good.
After the preflight, I approached one of the captains and asked if he was sure he was
in condition to fly that evening. That pissed him off and he reacted in the typical officerto-enlisted man way so familiar in the Army. I convinced myself that they werent that
drunk; at least I was hoping they werent. I really had no choice; any Sp 4 vs captain
contest was going to be won by the captain. After we took off, the nurse was standing in

the entry way to the cockpit watching the pilots and one of the captains told the Crew
Chief to give his helmet to the nurse. This is getting bad, I thought as the Crew Chief
did as ordered, which left him with no way to communicate with the rest of us. The
captain started chatting-up the nurse first telling her how to put the mic to her lips and
pressing the button when she wanted to talk. This is getting worse, I thought. He was
describing the landmarks as we were flying along and then he asked the nurse if she would
like to fly the helicopter! I nearly crapped when he said that and the nurse said, Oh, can
I? like it was something she always wanted to do. I was relieved when he then pointed to
a knob on the center console in front of her and told her to grab that knob. He was
actually pointing to the large knob that controlled the one steerable wheel on the Chinook.
The two front landing gear were fixed and the two rear landing gear swiveled, with the left
rear being steerable for ground taxiing it did nothing when we were in the air. He then
told her to turn the knob to the left and when she did so, he slowly banked the aircraft to
the left. He then told her to center the knob and he then leveled the aircraft. He did the
same routine for a right turn and the nurse was really getting excited thinking she was
flying the helicopter. The captain was telling her what a great job she was doing and as he
was praising her piloting skills he started to slowly raise the nose of the Chinook. He
paused for a second and then, in a more serious tone, told the nurse, Bring the nose
down. The higher the nose came the more insistent he became with her to get the nose
down. The only real effect of raising the nose was to slow the helicopter down and bring
it into a hover but it did feel a little unusual if you werent used to it. Since the knob only
turned left and right, there was really nothing she could do and she started to freak out and
scream into the mic. The whole routine was really very funny and the Crew Chief
couldnt figure out why the gunner and I were laughing so much. We made it to Long
Binh and back without further incident.

Figure 7: View of the cockpit from the cargo area. Large knob in the
lower console on the left, controlled the steerable landing gear.


I was on regular standby one day and just sitting in the helicopter trying to stay cool.
The maintenance crew had just towed one of our Chinooks from the hanger to the
revetment behind and to the left my helicopter and were preparing to start it up for a test
flight. Normally two of the maintenance officers did the test flights but this time I saw
WO Smith climb into the cockpit alone and he was only wearing a headset and not a full
helmet. I had only seen crewmembers wear helmets when flying and I knew it was
against company policy for a pilot to fly one of our helicopters solo but Mr. Smith cranked
up the engines and started to taxi out of the revetment by himself. To get to the runway,
he would have to taxi out of the revetment and turn right, behind my helicopter. Both of
our helicopters were facing in the same direction so he would be turning towards my
helicopter to pass behind us. As he taxied forward the back of his helicopter shifted to the
right because the steerable gear in the back had been left facing the wrong direction when
the maintenance crew parked it. The aft landing gear on a Chinook swivels like a
shopping cart wheel, so when the Chinook started forward the landing gear started to
swivel and moved the back of the helicopter to the right and very close to the wall of the
revetment. At that point, he should have shut everything down and had the maintenance
crew tow it back into position with the landing gear swiveled to the correct position. He
didnt however, and continued trying to make an impossibly tight right turn. I could see
that he would come very close to us so I ran to the front of our helicopter and pulled the
blades around so he would have as much room as possible to pass by the V formed by
our aft blades. As I was standing there watching him get closer and closer I felt the blade
I was holding shake and realized his blades were striking ours. As soon as I felt the blade
move, I turned and ran hoping I wouldnt be hit by the inevitable shrapnel that was about
to come from the disintegrating blades.
As I was running I looked back and saw Mr. Smiths helicopter bucking back and
forth as pieces of rotor blades were flying everywhere. The maintenance crew that had
been watching his progress were also running in all directions. When the helicopter
finally shut down, it was sitting in middle of the taxiway with all of its forward blades in
splinters. One of the maintenance guys had a broken leg from being hit by a piece of the
blade and we later found a four-foot section of a blade that had penetrated the steel side of
a nearby revetment.

CRASH
Our company had only C model Chinooks which were the latest, most powerful
version. Shortly after I arrived in country, we started receiving Super C models which
were essentially the same helicopter as the C model but with more powerful engines.
One of the first Super C models had a serial number ending in 022, inevitably referred
to as Oh Double Deuce, which got into a series of mishaps.
The first occurred when our CO, the first Major, decided to get a little flight time. He
was never part of the regular flying group of pilots but he occasionally flew, presumably
to keep his flight status/flight pay. As related to me by the gunner, the CO called
operations shortly after take-off and asked if there were any of our aircraft getting shot at.
It happened that one of our helicopters had taken some fire that day so the CO decided to
fly some sorties in the same area. As they were flying around in the hot area, they were
fired upon also, and a large caliber round (possibly 50 caliber) hit the helicopter just above
the gunners head and passed through the helicopter without hitting anything vital.
Nearly took my fuckin head off the gunner later told me. The CO then decided they
had flown enough and returned to base. We believed the CO was just looking for a reason
to get another medal.
The next event with 022 was during a hover in a heavily wooded area. The pilot got
a little too close to one of the trees and its blades made contact which resulted in a hard
landing in the small clearing. The damaged blades were replaced and the helicopter was
flown back to Phu Loi.

Figure 18: Chinook after blade strike.

I was assigned to fly as Crew Chief on 022 with a flight engineer I had only worked
with a couple of times. He was a good guy who didnt drink or take drugs so I always felt
good about working with him. He was letting me work the hole while he manned the right
gun. One of our jobs that day was to retrieve an Armored Personnel Carrier (APC) in
Cambodia and take it back to its base camp in Viet Nam for repairs. The APC we were to
recover was parked between a large ring of armored vehicles and a wooded area. We flew
in, hooked up to the APC and tried to lift it but after a couple attempts, we just couldnt
get it off the ground. Since we had recently refueled, the PIC decided we would fly
around a bit to burn off some fuel and then come back and try lifting it again he had too
much of a can do attitude to admit the APC was just too heavy for us.

Figure 19: Armored Personnel Carrier (APC)

The PIC was a first lieutenant that had recently taken a commission after coming to
Viet Nam as a warrant officer. He was the type of officer who liked to berate the enlisted
men about inconsequential details. For example, he instructed us one day before we took
off that all crewmen would wear their chicken plates at all times. Also, during all
approaches and departures, regardless where we were, the gunners were to stand at their
machine guns with their fingers on the triggers. That sort of detailed instruction was
uncommon because most pilots focused on flying the missions while letting the crew take
care of themselves. He was also the only officer that chewed me out for not calling him
Sir while we were flying. I thought he was an asshole.
We returned to the APC and again hooked up. This time, we got it about 10 feet off
the ground when everything went to hell. There was a loud bang and the helicopter started
lurching from side to side, forward and backward. My first reaction was to release the
load, as we were trained to do in case of emergency, but nothing happened when I pressed
the button to open the hook. I then reached for the manual D ring on the hook but the
helicopter lurched so violently I was thrown against the side and fell onto the bench next
to the hole. I could hear one of the pilots yelling at the other to help him push the controls
down and I decided to just hang onto the bench as tight as I could and try not to be thrown
out. I could have tried to pull the D ring again but, for some reason, I didnt. I like to
think it occurred to me that it was better to be anchored to the APC than to release the
hook and go tumbling off to who-knows-where but it was probably more of a

subconscious reaction. The APC had settled back on the ground and was acting as an
anchor as we flew in arcs hitting our blades on the ground on one side and then the other.
The biggest fear that went through my mind was that one of the blades would slice down
into the body of the helicopter and kill me but after the initial panic, I became very calm
and actually wondered what it would be like to be dead because I was sure I would be
very soon. It didnt take long for the blades to break up and we settled down onto our
right side with the APC wedged beneath us.
When we stopped moving, I looked forward and saw the gunner and flight engineer
climb up and out the left side. I then turned to go out the back but it was a wall of flames.
It briefly crossed my mind to grab one of the fire extinguishers to put out the blaze but I
was pretty sure they were too small to have any effect and I really didnt care if it
continued burning. I then decided to crawl out the hole. When I was outside, I still had
that feeling of calmness but it was now mixed with the joy of still being alive. I stood
next to the helicopter and took off my helmet and then my gloves. As I was doing so, I
saw the PIC running from the front of the helicopter toward the base of armored vehicles.
I then saw one of the grunts run up to the front of the helicopter. I put my gloves in my
helmet and set it on the ground next to the burning helicopter and walked up to where the
grunt had gone. The Pilot was unconscientious and still in the cockpit and the grunt was
trying to get him out through the space where the Plexiglas chin bubble used to be. Both
of us started pulling on the pilots feet but his legs were caught in the rudder pedals and
we were having a hard time getting him free. We finally got him on the ground and the
grunt told me to get a medic so I ran a few steps toward the armored vehicles and shouted,
MEDIC! The medics, who had obviously been watching us, replied, FUCK YOU.
BRING HIM OVER HERE! Their response surprised me; it certainly wasnt what they
would have said to John Wayne, I thought. The grunt grabbed the pilots legs and I
grabbed the top straps of his chicken plate and we carried him as quickly as we could to
where the medics were standing.
The helicopter was burning pretty well by now but I didnt think I was in that much
danger when we were getting the pilot free. Jet fuel is definitely combustible and we had
quite a bit of it in the tanks but its more like kerosene and not as volatile as gasoline.
Also, the Chinook has six fuel tanks; three on each side and they had rubber, self-sealing
(supposedly) liners. Since the fire appeared to have started in the rear of the aircraft, I
assumed the rear fuel tanks would be the first to ignite so I thought we had a good bit of
time before we were in any danger.

Figure 20: Remains of Chinook after the fire.

The PIC and the unconscious pilot were loaded into a smaller helicopter and flown to
a medical unit. I found the other two crewmembers who were sitting on the ramp of
another APC in the circle of armored vehicles and as I walked up, one of the armored guys
asked if I would like a beer. The armored guys had lawn chairs but the three of us sat on
the APC ramp drinking a beer watching our helicopter burn. It would occasional rumble
and rock as the fuel cells ignited and eventually the M-60 ammo started popping we had
a lot of M-60 ammo on board so it continued popping all the time we were there. Finally,
one of our sister ships came in and we walked over to it as it landed. The ramp came
down and Josh jumped out and grabbed me by my shoulders and shouted over the roar of
the helicopter, Are you o.k.? I assured him I was fine and we walked up the ramp into
the ship and they took us to the medical area where the pilots had been taken.
Im not sure why but we were taken to see the pilots. I think there was some
expectation that we, the crew, would congratulate each other on surviving the crash and
display that good old American spirit of comradery but it was mostly an awkward few
minutes of us, the enlisted crew, just standing at the foot of their beds with me wondering
why the PIC would leave his unconscious pilot in the burning helicopter. The Pilot had
regained conscientiousness and was generally unhurt but he was still groggy. The PIC
wore a leg cast for some time afterwards. I assumed he must have tripped on the dirt berm
next to the armored vehicles because it was hard to believe he could have run as fast as he
did from the helicopter with an injured leg.

Of course, no one told us why we crashed but it seemed pretty obvious to me that one
of the engines exploded. The pieces of the engine then cut our hydraulic lines so all the
controls froze (and the hook wouldnt open). Maybe the earlier blade strike had
something to do with it or perhaps the pilots over torqued the engines trying to lift the
APC. Possibly there was just a crappy part in the engine that failed. The Chinooks had
two complete hydraulic systems so if one failed, the other would still work or so they
told us in training. Unfortunately, they designed the systems so the lines from each were
next to each other and the exploding engine probably cut them both.
Someone suggested that VC may have shot us from the tree line and hit the engine,
causing it to explode and I hoped that was true being shot down sounded a lot better than
saying the helicopter just broke but that idea was quickly dismissed.

Figure 21: Aft pylon from crashed Chinook returned to Phu Loi.

A few days after the crash, I was called into the COs office and he had me briefly
explain my view of what had happened. When I finished, he said, I notice you didnt
report the loss of a weapon, didnt you have one? When I said I didnt, he gave me a
short lecture about how all crew members were expected to be armed when they were
flying. I was then dismissed. I had actually stopped carrying a weapon because, as a crew
chief, I had to carry the water jug and I thought the two M-60s and the gunners M-16
were plenty. I probably should have had one but it still pissed me off to go through the
scariest thing that had ever happened to me only to be bitched at for not burning up

another rifle.

Figure 22: My water jug recovered from the crashed Chinook.

FLIGHT ENGINEER
I was finally made a flight engineer and given one of the oldest helicopters in our
fleet. It was a C model, not a Super C which meant it couldnt lift as much as the
Super C models and I was fine with that. It was a great helicopter - very reliable and
flying 12 hour days was not uncommon. I was also assigned a really good Crew Chief
and I enjoyed the work. I had no ill effects from the crash and I was generally a pretty
happy soldier. Unfortunately, my helicopter was quickly approaching the time for major
overhaul. When the Chinooks reached a certain number of flight hours, they were sent
back to the repair depot for major overhaul and upgrade and mine reached that limit a
month or two after I received it. We flew it to Ben Hoa and picked up a newly refurbished
Super C in its place.
We had a few hours in Ben Hoa to wait until our new helicopter was ready so my
Crew Chief and I decided to wander around the Air Force base and take some pictures.
We were wearing our nomex flight suits so we kind of looked like we belonged and we
apparently had free access to the Air Force planes. We were particularly interested in one
of their gun ships and the crewman working on it saw us looking it over. He invited us in
and gave us a tour of the aircrafts armaments, obviously proud of this tremendous
aircraft. We continued looking around, snapping pictures when an Air Force major
spotted us. He was friendly but asked us what we were doing and explained that we were
in a restricted area. After asking for our camera film, he ordered us back to the Chinook
area to continue our wait.
The new Chinook was finally ready and we flew it back to Phu Loi. I wasnt
comfortable in the new helicopter from the beginning. It was nice to have a new aircraft
but I liked the old Chinook and was confident it would continue flying reliably while the
new one was unproven.
One of the most frightening experiences I had in Viet Nam occurred shortly after
getting the new Chinook and I wasnt directly involved. We were flying routine missions
one day and I had the Crew Chief working in the back while I manned the right gun. It
was possible to switch our intercoms so we could listen to the communications radios the
pilots used. It was handy at times to make sure you werent trying to communicate with
the pilots over the intercom while they were talking to someone else over the radios. It
was also interesting to hear what was going on in general because I normally had no idea
where we were and listening to the radios let me feel more connected. There were certain
radio frequencies reserved for emergency transmissions and were referred to as the
guard channels. These channels were monitored by just about everyone with a radio
and normally the only transmissions you heard was some anonymous GI shouting
obscenities followed by someone else reprimanding them for illegally using the guard
channel.
On this day, another Chinook pilot called MAYDAY on the guard channel. I dont
remember the exact wording but after calling MAYDAY he gave his call sign and
location and explained that he was having mechanical difficulty and losing control of his

aircraft. Our pilots checked the maps and determined he was too far away for us to do
anything even if we could. The panic in his voice was obvious as he described his status
and explained they were in a descent with conex boxes on the hook. His last transmission,
and the one Ill never forget was, WERE BECOMING INVERTED and then there
was silence. The terror in his voice was unnerving. Another pilot said he was overflying
the area and the Chinook had crashed. I later learned the entire crew had died.

SEPTEMBER 16, 1970

Josh, my first roommate in Viet Nam and good friend, died this day. We were made
flight engineers around the same time and he was given one of the new Super C aircraft.
As it was described to me, they were flying with a load on the hook at about 2,000 feet
when there was an explosion in the back and fire. They began descending with a growing
fire in the rear of the aircraft. The fire grew so intense that the crew leaned as far as
possible out of the front door to escape the flames. Josh actually climbed out of the
aircraft and was hanging from the side, holding onto the door. As they descended over a
rubber plantation, Josh let go or lost his grip and fell to his death. The other two
crewmembers were severely burned but survived.
There were obviously similarities between Joshs crash and mine. In both cases, an
engine had apparently exploded, hydraulic pressure was lost which made control of the
aircraft impossible and there was an intense fire. I was lucky to have the engine failure so
close to the ground, tethered to the APC while Josh was trapped in the aircraft at altitude.
Joshs crash occurred about three months after mine. We hadnt been as close as we
were when we started in the maintenance platoon but we were still good friends and could
rely on each other in times of need.
I began to dislike flying after Joshs death. It was obvious to me that the new Super
C models had problems and my guess was the engines were too powerful for the rest of
the drivetrain. Of course, as an enlisted man, no one told me what the problems were but
they did eventually ground all of the Super Cs until the engines could be replaced. Since
my new helicopter was a Super C, I had very little to do during that period. We would
run up the engines every few days for a half hour or so and that was it.

UNVOLUNTEERING
The engines on my Chinook were finally replaced and we started flying missions
again. My distaste (fear) for flying grew day by day and I was happy for any reason to
stay on the ground. Finally, one day, I was dealing with a pretty bad hangover and I really
didnt want to be in the air. We carried a set of repair manuals on each helicopter and
referred to them often when mechanical problems occurred. At some point in the past, I
had been researching an issue in the manuals and noticed that a tolerance was specified for
a part in the rotor assembly that I thought was surprisingly small. The specific part was
integral in controlling the pitch of the blades and any failure in that assembly would
certainly be catastrophic but I was pretty sure most of the aircraft on our flight line
wouldnt meet the specified tolerance. If this part is out of tolerance it was a Red X
condition, which meant the aircraft had to be grounded until it was repaired.
When we stopped for lunch, I volunteered to stay with the helicopter as the pilots and
rest of the crew left in search of a mess hall at the firebase we were working from that
day. Before they returned, I got the feeler gauge from the tool box and climbed up the aft
pylon were the assembly was located. As expected, the part was out of tolerance by
several thousandths of an inch. When the rest of the crew returned, I told them we had to
quit for the day because of a mechanical issue. The pilots were surprised since everything
appeared to be working fine before lunch and it was obvious they thought I was giving
them a load of crap. I then showed them the appropriate section of the maintenance
manual and we climbed up the aft pylon so they could check the tolerance themselves.
They were finally satisfied that I was correct but it was obvious they were wondering why,
out of the millions of parts in the helicopter, I would check such an obscure item that just
happened to out of tolerance.
There was a tech inspector and maintenance crew waiting for us when we shut down
at Phu Loi and they planned on getting us back into the air as soon as possible. The tech
inspector checked the log book for the Red X and climbed up the aft pylon to check the
clearance. After reviewing the maintenance manual he agreed the assembly should be
replaced and turned the ship over to the maintenance crew to fix it.
I felt terrible. Not because of the hangover but because I felt like a coward. What I
had done was technically correct but my motives were all wrong and I felt very alone. I
had finally started to feel the whole Viet Nam experience wasnt right. I had actually
enjoyed being in Viet Nam at first but I now started to feel this was serious and I could die
for no apparent purpose, just as Josh had and just as the crew of the inverted Chinook had.
I was sitting against a revetment, smoking a cigarette and thinking about what I had
done when I noticed the maintenance guy working on my helicopter jerking on the bolt,
trying to get it out. I knew the bolt should come out pretty easily if he was doing it
correctly and I then realized he hadnt locked the blades. The bolt/hinge device that was
out of tolerance was the piece that allowed the links or vertical rods to the blades to
change the blades pitch. Pulling the bolt out without locking the blades would allow the
part holding the bottom of the links to rotate one way while the rotor head rotated in the

opposite direction. If that happened, the links would bind and place a tremendous amount
of stress on both the base of the blades and the attachment points on the swashplate as well
as the links. Locking the blades was a simple step of putting pins in alignment holes at the
base of each blade to stop them from changing pitch which prevented the twisting motion.
The mechanic simply forgot to do that. I started to get up to tell him to stop when he gave
the bolt a final yank, it came out and he nearly fell from the pylon platform. At the same
time, all three blades abruptly twisted as the swashplate rotated and bound up the links.
The maintenance guy was new and I hadnt met him before but he realized immediately
what he had done. My attitude instantly changed from guilt to indignation and I started
yelling at everyone there; the mechanic, the guy in charge of the maintenance squad and
finally the tech inspector. Everyone realized that the relatively simple fix caused by my
few thousandths of an inch issue now turned into a potentially major maintenance project.
I was being an asshole about the whole thing while everyone else was calmly trying
to assess the damage and determine what needed to be done to fix it. Finding myself
being ignored, I left them to their work.
After talking it over with the captain in charge of maintenance and the maintenance
NCO, the tech inspector came to me to explain what they were going to do. I had decided
in the interim that the only thing that would satisfy me would be for them to replace
everything connected to the links that was stressed by the twisting when the blades fell.
That included all three blades, the links and the swashplate. Doing that would require
disassembly of the rotor, which was a pretty major process. The tech inspector explained
that he had looked everything over and the only damage had been to the links, which were
bent and would be replaced a much more simple process that would require unbolting
the old links and bolting in the new ones and then adjusting the blade tracking a quicker
solution than mine. I asked him about the stress points where the links were attached and
he replied that they looked fine but they would do a dye/penetrant test on each one to
make sure they werent cracked. The dye/penetrant test was fine if cracks were large
but it was pretty well known that it wasnt 100% reliable.
Our discussion became more heated until finally I said, YOU DONT HAVE TO
FLY IN THAT FUCKING THING, I DO!!! Immediately after saying that, I felt bad.
The tech inspector was a good guy and really took his work seriously. He lived every day
with the knowledge that peoples lives depended on how well he did his job and he
certainly didnt need me to remind him of it. I knew I had lost the argument actually, I
knew I never had a chance of winning the argument to begin with. I was only a Specialist
4, the tech inspector was a Specialist 6, the maintenance NCO was an E-7 and the
maintenance officer was a captain. They could have just told me to shut-up and go away
and thats what I would have done so the tech inspector listening to me rant was an
indication of how seriously he took his job.
They continued with their planned repairs and, as I expected, the dye/penetrant test
showed nothing. I didnt like flying before but I really didnt like to fly now.
After a few more days flying regular, uneventful but stress filled missions, I decided I
had enough. To get into the flight platoon, I had to volunteer so logic told me I could

volunteer to get out of it, which I did. I met with the flight platoon leader, WO Smith, and
let him know that I was volunteering to rejoin the maintenance platoon. I wasnt refusing
to fly; I was just unvolunteering. I had two months left before I was to return to the US
and I really didnt want to fly any longer. At that point, I knew the whole Viet Nam
experience was meaningless and there was no reason for me to continue doing something
that caused me so much stress. WO Smith was obviously unsure of how he should react.
There was no denying that flying was voluntary but apparently, no one had volunteered
not to fly before. WO Smith said he would get back to me.
I had no idea how they would react and actually expected them to tell me cut the crap
and get back to work. Surprisingly though, WO Smith looked me up later that day and
told me to move my stuff out of the flight platoon hooch and back to the maintenance area.
I would begin in maintenance the next day. I guess there were plenty of guys willing to
fly and whatever I did really didnt make that much difference to anyone or anything.
As you would expect, leaving my hooch mates was a little awkward but I felt I had
done enough and I was glad I didnt have to fly again. I was surprised to find my old
hooch in the maintenance area, where Josh and I had first lived, was empty so I moved
into the back half, where Bartowski used to live.
For the next two months, my life was routine; I worked on helicopters during the day,
read just about any book I could find in the evenings and spent quite a bit of time in the
EM club. I did feel like I was showing up on the bunker guard roster more than normal
but I didnt complain. I just counted the days until I could go home.

PROMOTION
I had come to Viet Nam and a Specialist 4, having been quickly promoted from E-1
to that rank in AIT. I learned that I was eligible to go to the Specialist 5 promotion board
shortly after I stopped flying and my name was added to the list for an interview.
Obviously, my expectation of being promoted wasnt very high but I polished my boots,
trimmed my mustache and got a haircut and new set of fatigues for the event.
When my turn came, I entered the room, came to attention, saluted and said
something like Specialist 4 Eckhart reporting to the promotion board as ordered, Sir!
Standing there, I immediately noticed I had come to attention facing directly into the sun,
which was coming through the windows behind the board members. The sun was
blinding and I really couldnt see who I was talking to. The first comment I heard was,
Specialist Eckhart, were NCOs, theres no need to call us sir. My thought was, well,
o.k. then, who the fuck are you? I cant see you First Sargent? Sargent Major? Command
Sargent Major? So I weakly responded, Yes, Sargent, sure that I was insulting
whoever I was talking to by not acknowledging their proper rank. They asked me a few
questions about general orders and other stuff I had learned in basic and I answered those
correctly. They then asked me what the capital of North Korea is. I had no idea and
simply said, I dont know. One of the board members then said, I see in your record
that you were in the flight platoon but you are now in maintenance, why is that?
Expecting that question, I responded that I had learned so much during my time here that
I felt I could make a more significant contribution by working in maintenance and assist in
training the new mechanics. I really didnt expect anyone to accept that bullshit and they
obviously didnt.
When the promotion list came out, I placed around 380 in the promotion list of 400
and our battalion had about 50 promotion slots available so I only missed being promoted
by about 330 guys. That was when President Nixons Vietnamization program started
cranking up, however, and a number of aviation companies had been turned over to the
Vietnamese by then. Specialist 5 slots for those Vietnamized companies still existed,
however, even though the companies didnt and the promotion slots were given to the
remaining companies. Everyone on the list was promoted.

BACK TO THE USA

My orders to return to the states arrived a few weeks before my year was up so I was
pleasantly surprised when they came. I still had over a year left on my enlistment so my
joy for leaving Viet Nam was tempered a bit by the realization that I still had a long time
left in the Army. After a 30 day leave, I was to report to Ft. Rucker, Alabama, the Army
Aviation Center.
At Ft. Rucker, I discovered the company I was assigned to did not exist. I was sent to
several different administration groups and no one had heard of it so they decided to cut
new orders and assign me to another company. While reporting in at the new company
orderly room, I asked the company clerk how many Chinooks they had, assuming I would
be working as a Chinook mechanic. He laughed and said, Chinooks? We dont have any
Chinooks. I then asked what the company did and he explained they painted curbs,
mowed grass, trimmed hedges and generally performed any kind of maintenance work
that was needed around the base.
The thought of doing shit work for the next year was very disheartening but the
Vietnamization program was sending so many troops back to the States that there just
wasnt enough open jobs for the returning troops to fill. The company clerk then gave me
directions to the personnel office where I would complete the necessary paperwork to join
my new company.

OFFICER RECORDS SPECIALIST

At the personnel office, I was talking to the clerk complaining about my luck at being
given such a terrible assignment when I noticed that everyone had a typewriter. I had
taken typing in high school and, thinking anything was better than painting curbs and
mowing grass, I asked the clerk if they needed any help. Im a great typist I said.
He looked at my aptitude scores, decided I wasnt a total moron and took my file to
the NCO in charge. They then explained their Officer Records Specialist was soon getting
out of the Army and they needed a replacement so they changed my orders again and I
began on-the-job training to be a personnel clerk.
My new job was pretty easy and required that I file evaluations, promotions and
various other documents in the personnel files of the officers assigned to our battalion. I
also typed various documents and generally shuffled a lot of paperwork.
Since the work I was given wasnt nearly enough to fill the day, I started researching
various topics in the Army regulations and one day, decided to file for Conscientious
Objector (CO) status. I completed all the necessary paperwork and submitted it to the
NCO in charge of our group who passed it along to the Warrant Officer in charge of the
office. The Warrant Officer called me in and said, I see youre filling for CO status? I
said, Yes, sir and he then asked, Why? Youve already been to Viet Nam. I then
explained that I didnt think the war in Viet Nam was right and I wanted my record to
reflect that. He just shook his head and dismissed me. I was pretty sure my request would
eventually slip off his desk and accidently fall in the trash can but filling out the forms was
something to do to fill the day. I also filed a number of requests for transfer, citing various
regulations as reasons I should be move to a different location (all of which happened to
closer to home) and all of them were routinely denied.
When a new officer was assigned to our group, he was required to bring me his
personnel file and fill out a few forms. One day, I looked up and was surprised to see the
Warrant Officer I had helped drag out of our crashed helicopter in Cambodia. We
immediately recognized each other but he said nothing about Viet Nam. I had been a little
disappointed that he didnt at least thank me for carrying him away from the crash but he
never said anything to me when we were in Viet Nam and he said nothing about it now. I
processed his paperwork and he left.

ETS
My time at Ft. Rucker wasnt bad at all. The work was fine and I made several good
friends so the time passed pretty quickly. I also decided I would go to college when I got
out and took a college English course in the evenings while I was there.
Six months before I was to leave the Army, a directive came down that anyone who had
six months or less left to serve could be released immediately if they wished. I happily
accepted the offer and was finally discharged.