These brave men had a one-in-three chance of being killed or wounded when flying rescue missions in Vietnam, and over the course of the war Dustoff saved 900,000 lives.
18 and 19 year old men flying unarmed helicopters into battle, at night, in the rain, and multiple times a day, to rescue our wounded and fly them back to medical facilities.
George (Huey gunship side door gunner) wrote this (following) in the comments, but I think it belongs here too... so, thank you again George!
"there were two groups I put above our own gunships.
US Infantrymen and Dustoff crews.
At the 25th Infantry base camp at Cu Chi and probably other big base camps we had a small building on the airfield that we and other units would rotate night standbys in the event the base came under attacks.
We kept a pair of gunship there and would sleep there in our clothes. Had a hard line telephone to our operations building that was open 24-7.
Ships had all necessary switches in the on position. If we got the call to help some unit or Dust Off we were cranking power within a minute.
One pilot on the controls and one on the maps and making contact with the unit in need. Weather never kept us down. If it was a Dust Off mission we would be talking to them as we flew. Once there they and us would have most all aircraft lights off. The ground troops would talk that ship in then turn on a small pin light pointed straight up. As they started down they would not be able to see what the landing area looked like so they might turn on their big landing light to see if there were any tree trumps, craters etc.
Usually the bad guys would open up on them and we would open up on them.
Quite a fireworks show.
Our biggest customer day or night was the 2/27th Wolfhounds of the 25th
Our ID and our money was no good in their NCO or Officers' club at Cu Chi.
I always like the night missions as it was really peaceful to and from the AO.
I told this to a Infantry friend of mine. Not sure if I told you this but there were two groups I put above our own gunships. US Infantrymen and Dustoff crews. At the 25th Infantry base camp at Cu Chi and probably other big base camps we had a small building on the airfield that we and other units would rotate night standbys in the event the base came under attacks. We kept a pair of gunship there and would sleep there in our clothes. Had a hard line telephone to our operations building that was open 24-7. Ships had all necessary switches in the on position. If we got the call to help some unit or Dust Off we were cranking power within a minute. One pilot on the controls and one on the maps and making contact with the unit in need. Weather never kept us down. If it was a Dust Off mission we would be talking to them as we flew. Once there they and us would have most all aircraft lights off. The ground troops would talk that ship in then turn on a small pin light pointed straight up. As they started down they would not be able to see what the landing area looked like so they might turn on their big landing light to see if there were any tree trumps, craters etc. Usually the bad guys would open up on them and we would open up on them. Quite a fireworks show. Only way it could get any worse was heavy rain and I always carried my field jacket. Our biggest customer day or night was the 2/27th Wolfhounds of the 25th ID and our money was no good in their NCO or Officers' club at Cu Chi. I always like the night missions as it was really peaceful to and from the AO. We went home every night but you guys didn't have that option. That was always on my mind. They should be giving you guys a like award in my opinion.
ReplyDeletethanks for adding this story! Wow! It's amazing to read a 1st hand account of what the day to day feelings were of a guy in that moment! I added most of this to the post because only some people read the comments, but everyone read the posts
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