Z and crew,

I was reading a thread on another website and MTV piped in with some cool info about an old FAA inspector. That prompted a few off the cuff stories about the same guy. I realized while I was reading that the stories about this inspector's character and his interactions with people are extremely volatile. One day they might not exist.

Now I'm not saying our old pilots are old, but they're not getting any younger. I wonder if we could start a forum for guys that have been around for a minute (i.e. - before the new modern safety features, weather data, navigation tools, etc.) to tell stories about the good ol' days?

I absolutely love hearing/reading stories about how things used to be and old personalities and situations we'd be hard pressed to find ourselves in today. Most of my favorites are the old Alaska flying stories, when they dead-reckoned their aircraft all over the wilderness and worked daily with characters that are few and far between in the modern, digital age. Bud Helmericks' The Last of the Bush Pilots is the most enjoyable book I've read in the last 10 years. I loved it because of the pilot, the era, and the people that it represented. I also love hearing about Contact's Vietnam exploits and Jughead's story. I'm sure I'm not alone in this.

We need a place to capture our seasoned pilots' accounts about their careers, the places, and the people they worked with back when times were a little different. A place for them to tell us their stories and for us to listen.

I know it sounds a lot like "around the campfire," but I'm thinking a bit more specific. Maybe, "around the campfire with uncles Gump, MTV, Hardtailjohn, etc." Heck, maybe just "Campfire Stories with Uncle Aviator"

Anyway, its just an idea that you may or may not have already thought about.

In the meantime, I need to get some campfire time with our seasoned pilots so I can listen to some cool stories!

Cameron,

The problem with war stories is that we have told them so many times, and interjected interesting new facts along the way, that we can't remember what really happened. I prefer situational stories that make a point. That way embellishment is more purposeful. Ask a question and I usually have a story for it.

That said, I did take a Creative Writing Short Story course while recovering from my last and only hurtful crash. I found that I was not very creative. I just changed the names to protect the innocent and used some of my old war stories. Here is one of them:

Jim Dulin
Don' Ask Don't Tell

Specialist Basilia Montoya watched as Sargent Joseph Badonie, fire extinguisher in hand, looked through the engine inspection panel of the medevac Huey. She liked the smell of the desert foliage in the cool night air, but she didn't like the smell of jet fuel.
Chief Warrant Officer Gregory Jackson turned the master switch and fuel on. The navigation lights began flashing. “Clear!”
“Clear,” Joe yelled.
Greg pulled the start trigger on the collective and punched the stop watch button on the eight day clock. The whorl of the compressor spinning and the popping of the igniters sounded like the tapping of a rock band drummers sticks to get the cadence. The explosion, when the fuel dropped at 20% N1, was the blast of the full rock band, however. Within one minute the engine had spooled up. Greg put his Mickey Mouse eared helmet on and plugged in the avionics cord. “Sixty six hundred RPM, rotor in the green, twelve hundred pounds fuel, all green, no caution, no warning, bleed air off,” he called out the abbreviated checklist. “Badonie?” he asked while strapping in.
“Up.”
“Montoya?”
“Up.” Basilia, the medic, liked Mr. Jackson. She thought he was interesting. She had gotten him to take her to dinner a couple of drill weekends even though he was married. Although she hadn't gotten him to kiss her, she considered it good training for the real thing. She did not like Captain Trujillo, however. He had made her help fill the water buffalo which caused her to break a nail. Worse, he had grounded her until she changed from her tailored Nomex flight suit. He said it was a safety violation because the tailor's thread was not Nomex. She considered him a hard ass who was just trying to impress the Commanding Officer. She knew she could use her longer than regulation black hair, her deep brown eyes, and her perfect figure to impress the CO more. 1
As the stop watch second hand passed twelve the second time, Captain Jesus Trujillo mounted the Aircraft Commander's seat and pointed toward the right front. The Huey immediately lifted off as Greg pulled collective pitch and climbed to four thousand feet in the direction indicated.
“First Up off at zero one two four,” Greg radioed. He liked Basilia. He just liked being around her. He loved his wife and had chosen her more for her intelligence and work ethic than for her beauty. They both taught on the Navajo Reservation. They had two boys and he was dedicated to his family, but Basilia was intoxicating.
Jesus plugged his helmet in and switched his mike to hot. “Heading three three zero, five miles, poppa echo six six seven five four eight, one patient, throat trauma from the recoil of a one oh five cocking lever, hyper-ventilation and disorientation,” he said as he strapped in. A very traditional Catholic with six children, he loved flying medevac. He had been a LRRP on his first tour in Vietnam. The Army had given him the chance to be a legal American and had made him an officer through OCS. After Infantry Officer Basic and Officer Rotary Wing Aviation School, he had flown the Huey, lifting Big Red One infantrymen into hot Lzs, on his second tour. He was now full time National Guard. He was keeping Montoya on his ship because she was the weakest link in his section. He showed Greg the topographical map while pointing to the dot in a circle he had qrease penciled over the objective. He put the laminated map on the instrument panel between them, took the cyclic in his right hand, the collective in his left hand, and put his feet on the anti-torque pedals. “I have the controls.”
“You have the controls,” Greg said as he released the controls on his side the Huey. He picked up the map and oriented it with two mountains he could see in the moonlight and the dirt road running between them. “Come right five degrees,” he ordered.
“Shit,” Jesus said. The Huey had passed over the top of a cloud illuminated by the full moon. He began a descending turn to reverse course and lose altitude. “We'll try low level up the road. Look sharp, the mountains top out at thirty five hundred.” He reversed course again while descending to one hundred feet above ground level. He pointed the Huey toward the cloud obscured mountains 1 and switched the landing light and searchlight on.. “Do you have a decent map recon Greg?
“Yes sir.”
“You have the controls,” Jesus said.
“I have the controls,” Greg said. He maneuvered the Huey down the dirt road at forty knots.
Jesus switched the FM transmitter to 27.3 and pulled the cyclic trigger all the way back. “Rattler Two Six, this is Dustoff One Niner One. Over.”
“Dustoff One Niner One, this is Rattler Two Six. Over.”
“Rattler Two Six, Dustoff is three minutes out. We're coming up the road from the south. How are you going to mark the LZ? Over.”
“Dustoff, Rattler Two Six. I'm on the road with my jeep lights on emergency flash. Over.”
“Roger Two Six. I understand one patient. We'll set down twenty meters south of your Jeep on the road. Is that area clear of wires and other obstructions? Over.”
“Dustoff, Rattler Two Six. One patient and LZ clear. Over.”
“Two Six, Dustoff has you in sight. Keep your people clear. My people will come to you.”
“Dustoff, Rattler Two Six. Wilco.”
“Slow Greg, very, very, slow,” Jesus ordered. “Montoya, do you need Joe to bring the backboard?”
“Yes sir.”
“Badonie, keep them away from the tail rotor.”
“Wilco sir.”
“Way to shake it in slow, Greg. Nose clear down left,” Jesus said.
“Nose clear down right,” Greg said.
“Tail clear down left,” Joe said.
The Huey approached the flashing Jeep lights at five knots forward speed and twenty feet per minute vertical speed. 1
“Montoya?” Jesus yelled.
“Tail clear down right,” Basilia answered as she remembered to check for obstructions on the right side of the Huey. She hated the helicopter safety and maintenance procedures. She didn't think it was necessary for medics to be involved in maintenance and she especially didn't like getting her hands greasy. It was fine with most of the pilots if she just watched the crew chief, as a part of her cross training, but Captain Trujillo insisted that she actually take oil samples, clean filters, and even stand on the stinger to push and pull on the tail rotor pitch change links. Like she knew what ten thousands or more play was anyway.
As the Huey touched down facing the Jeep, Joe went to the nose with the backboard and checked to make sure no one approached the helicopter. Basilia approached the Jeep where a Second Lieutenant pointed her to the right front seat. “How are you doing,” she asked. She shined her flashlight in the eyes of the young Private First Class, checking for uneven dilation She thought he was a very attractive Anglo.
“I... troub... breath,” he said as he took short, shallow breaths.
“Don't talk. I'm going to make you a better airway,” she said. “Move your hands. Can you lay down on the backboard? Don't move your head around.”
“Yes,” he said. He laid down on the backboard that Joe had put on the ground by the Jeep.
After strapping the Private to the backboard, Basilia and Joe loaded him onto the litter mounted across the front of the transmission housing. Joe strapped the backboard to the litter. Jesus had turned the dome light on. Basilia plugged in her helmet and placed her index finger on the Private's Adam's apple. After measuring a thumbs distance below her finger, she swabbed and cut a deep, quarter inch long slit in his trachea. She inserted a plastic tube and taped it in place. The Private immediately began breathing normally through the tube. While she got the Private's blood pressure and temperature, Joe closed both cargo bay doors and connected his avionic cord. He strapped into the door-gunner position next to the transmission housing behind the litter. Basilia strapped into 1 the jump-seat, between the pilots, that was mounted facing rearward toward the Private.
“I'll buy if you'll fly,” Jesus said to Greg. “Sixty six hundred RPM, rotor in the green, nine hundred eighty pounds fuel, all green, no caution, no warning, bleed air off.”
Greg brought the aircraft up to a five feet hover. “Nose coming left, tail coming right.”
“Nose clear left,” Joe said. He didn't like Basilia. She was a beautiful Mexican, but he liked Navajo or Pueblo girls. They were tougher even than Chicanas and Basilia wasn't even Chicana. She was traditional, which he found interesting, but she fooled around a lot.
“Tail clear right,” Basilia said.
Greg pedal turned 180 degrees and took off down the road.
Jesus switched to the frequency of the Army Reserve Combat Support Hospital. “Five Sixty Third Ops, this is Dustoff One Niner One. Over.“
“Dustoff One Niner One, this is Five Sixty Third Operations. Over.”
“You're up Montoya,” Jesus said on intercom while holding five fingers up by her face.
Basilia pushed the mike button on her avionics cord. “Five Sixty Third Ops, Dustoff One Nine One. Five minutes out with one patient. Crushed trachea. Blood pressure one sixty over ninety. Temperature ninety eight. Cricothyrotomy performed. Airway established. Negative fluids.”
Jesus pressed his cyclic mike trigger to the second click. “Over,” he radioed.
“Dustoff One Niner One, this is Five Sixty Third Ops. Roger. Pad one. Over.”
“This is Dustoff One Niner One. Pad One. Out,” Jesus answered.
At the jet-pack inflated Combat Support Hospital helipad, two nurses helped Basilia and Joe offload the Private and carry him into the emergency room. Joe returned with the backboard, strapped in, and plugged in. “We're up back here,” he said on the intercom.
Jesus took off and made the approach to the Dustoff helipad. “Dustoff Ops, First Up is down at zero one four two with one plus four zero fuel remaining.”
“First up down at zero one four two with one plus four zero fuel,” a sleepy RTO answered 1 as he entered it in the duty log.
After shutdown and on the way to the nearby ready tent, Jesus spotted a serious problem. “Where's Basilia?” he asked.
“At the hospital,” Joe answered. “She said she needed to talk to the emergency room doctor about the Private. I should have told you back there.”
“I messed up as bad as you Joe,” Jesus said. “I didn't check my crew before leaving the hospital pad. Get down there and get her back here ASAP. Take the duty jeep.”
“Yes sir.”
“Greg, stay put in the ready tent. Third Up is RON on a back haul to March Air Force Base. I'll go round up Second Up. No need for the Ops runner to have to wake up. We'll go back to First Up as soon as I get Basilia squared away.”
. . . .
Joe and Basilia walked into the ready tent. The Second Up crew were all there, dressed, and sitting on the cots.
“Walk out to the helicopter with me,” Jesus ordered.
Nobody questioned who he meant and Basilia walked to the helipad with him.
“First, you did an excellent job with the cricothyrotomy. You obviously paid attention in the goat lab during our summer camp at Brooke last summer.”
“Thank you sir.” Basilia had enjoyed working with the Anglo doctors and male nurses at Ft. Sam Houston.
“Second, you don't have to like me.”
Basilia looked down but said nothing.
“Now tell me how you endangered yourself, your crew, and your customers tonight.”
“At the hospital?
“No. At the LZ dammit.” 1
“By not clear...ing my side down quickly?” She shuffled her feet.
“Have you witnessed a blade strike, soldier?”
“No sir.” That's a dumb question she thought. She was nineteen and had been in the Guard only eighteen months.
“If we had clipped a pole on your side, honeycombed aluminum from the right rotor blade would have gotten the Private and his section leader. The force of the blade stopping suddenly would have thrown the transmission forward getting you and Greg. The loss of lift on right side would have taken place ninety degrees away in the direction of rotation causing the nose to go straight into the ground flipping the helicopter and getting me. Joe would have survived if the missile damage from the other rotor blade or the exploding compressor blades that had been going thirty three thousand RPM didn't get him. Then we all would have burned. The Nomex would have protected us for five minutes, unless we had unauthorized tailoring. Few have witnessed a blade strike because few witnesses have lived through it.”
Jesus paused but Basilia said nothing. A tear formed in her right eye.
“You're a dental assistant in real life, right?”
“Yes sir.”
“Would you like to become a nurse, pilot, or doctor?”
“I would like to be a doctor.”
“Your family has been in the Las Cruses area over three hundred years, right? Montoya Land and Cattle Company?
“Yes sir.” Basilia hadn't advertised her economic and political connections. She had preferred to make her own opportunities.
“I used to transplant onions and pick chili for your grandfather in the Mesilla Valley. The Guard can help you become a doctor if you'll get your shit together and start acting like a soldier. Why aren't you in college?” 1
“I don't want my father to control me.” He's almost as controlling as you are, she thought.
“Now tell me about going AWOL tonight.”
“I wanted to watch him until he got in the OR.”
“You're a medic, for the sake of our blessed Savior. They have doctors in there. They threw your pretty ass out anyway, right?”
“Yes sir.” She had been shocked by how uncooperative the doctors had been.
“The Iranian rescue fiasco has made the Joint Chiefs crazy. The Army has over one hundred thousand troops training here at Fort Irwin. That was the whole Hundred and First Airborne Division that made that combat jump Monday morning. We hauled fifty six of them by noon; five of them dead. Everybody is bone tired and we still have a mission. Why do you think Second Up crew is in the ready tent?”
“Because you can't be First Up without a medic,” Basilia sobbed. She was crying openly now.
“Saint Paul said if you can't control your hormones you should get married. Father Murphy and I would like to see that for you. It would relieve a lot of tension in this unit. But you have a right to 'Be all you can be, in the Army,' as the slogan goes. I won't help you if you mess with my married pilots. We lost Mr. Stoner, I think, because of suspected abominable sexual orientation. I don't know and I don't care. Our blessed Savior ordered us not to judge. Stoner was a good soldier and a good pilot and he didn't advertise any kind of orientation. I expect the same of you. Just take it easy and don't advertise. No mas! Is that clear?”
“Yes sir. I hadn't considered how my flirting would affect the unit.”
“Get back to the ready tent because we're going back on First Up. Vaya con Dios.”
“Yes sir.” As Balisia walked back to the ready tent she considered her options. She wasn't ready to commit to the Army, college, or to the grower's son, a senior next fall at NMSU, who had proposed. She was willing, however, to quit messing with Captain Trujillo's pilots and try to be a better medic, perhaps even a better soldier.

Things got tense for those who, nearing seven hours, had not learned to hover. Takeoff, landing, and autorotations could be knocked out in just a few hours. Hovering requires dynamic proactive anti-torque pedal movement, dynamic proactive collective pitch movement, and dynamic proactive cyclic pitch movement all uncoordinated. To add insult to injury, power had to be added, with a motorcycle type throttle, when collective pitch was added. Power had to be decreased when collective pitch was decreased. Two hands, two feet, and one palm was continuously in motion. At least the throttle and collective required coordinated movement.

Most instructors teach pedals, then collective with throttle, and finally cyclic. We had a 2nd Lieutenant Pobre, from Hawaii, who was around seven hours when he got the last control, the cyclic. He came in after a his lesson that day and said, "I got the cyclic and hovered by myself. It was cool, but I was worried the instructor was going to poke some other control in my mouth.

I poisoned myself trying to get Parathion laced used spray pumps to work on my Callair in Fabens, Texas. After the third try, I figured out that my clockwise turning Weatheraero pump fan was not going to work with a counterclockwise turning pump.

The temperature had been 114 that day. My tired loader had talked me into using the right tank to calibrate. I forgot to go back to the left tank I always used and I ran the right, my emergency five gallons, dry over the Rio Grande. Toxicologically high I screwed the forced landing up and cartwheeled it onto a drainage ditch.

Now the story. I was in the Henny Penny eating breakfast while the EPA guy was telling me I would have to drain that ditch and dispose of it in a hazardous waste site. That ditch was fifty feet wide at the top, twenty feet wide at the bottom, and a mile long. Bankruptcy was the only answer.

And then Gail Surratt, who's onions I had been spraying, came in and sat by me. "Are you guys talking about Jim's spill out there," he asked? Before the EPA man could answer, Mr.Surratt said loudly, " I opened the gate and let that shit on down the river. " The EPA man left without comment.

Yeah! Nice story I think. It would be good as a snippet leading up to the bigger meat and potatoes plot. Maybe BigRenna can play you. I'll be Jesus Trujillo and edit.
What does parathion do to you to make you crash, or is it mostly a deal where you are trying too hard to get out of the mist and you screw up? It has short term effects? I figured all that stuff took 30 years to kill you. We used to have to plant cantelope wearing long rubber gloves because of Furidan. Much of my childhood was spent avoiding toxic stuff that is largely illegal now.

Both the old Parathion and the newer Furidan are nerve agents. The greater safety of Furidan is that it is a contact killer and does not make a gas. It also goes away faster. You can tell an old Pawnee once sprayed Parathion even today by the smell. It never goes away. Any low dose of nerve agent will make you high. We are both probably still high, just kidding.

My grandfather started flying in September of 1918 with the US Army Air Corps. Later he flew the mail in open cockpit Jenny’s, an airplane powered by an 90hp engine that boasted a TBO of just over 30 hours. I’ve got his mail bag with slots for Salt Lake, Ogden, Pocatello, Butte, Helena, and Great Falls.

That was his route year round, without navigation aids or radio communication or weather forecasts worth a damn. I’ve also got his flying suit, goggles, cap, gloves and overboots. They leave little doubt as to the temperature in the cockpit during those flights.

On flying Grandpa had this to say: “Most dangerous thing in the world is to fly with a hangover. If you’re hungover and have to fly, better get a couple drinks in you first.”

God I loved that man.

Hammer wrote:
On flying Grandpa had this to say: “Most dangerous thing in the world is to fly with a hangover. If you’re hungover and have to fly, better get a couple drinks in you first.”

God I loved that man.

Please re-post this in the "Favorite Quotes" thread!!!!

Pierre

Love these stories, guys!

Keep 'em coming, please!

I love old guy stories, but I fear the best will only ever be heard around a campfire. There is much prudence to be exercised in posting some stories to the Internet, at least if you're still exercising your pilot privileges.

Jim Dulin The Job 13

“I just can't see where a lowly warrant gets off telling commissioned officers where to go and how to get there,” protested Captain Davis, the Gun Platoon Leader, rising from the stacked rocket boxes that served as a bar bench. What remained of his Jack Daniels and Coke slopped onto Chief Warrant Officer John Burton's leg.
“Bite my ass,” Mr. Burton spat back.
“Bite my ass. Bite my ass. Is that the extent of your command vocabulary Lobo White?”
“I lead by example,” the Scout Platoon Leader blurted. “I'll bite that rat's ass if it will get my people moving.” He spilled his drink down the front of his sweaty Nomex flight suit as he pointed, with his plastic cup, to the dead fall rat trap in the corner of the general personnel medium tent that served as the Echo Troop Officer's Club in Tay Ninh, Vietnam.
“Bullshit,” challenged Cpt. Davis.
“Blue Mike, fetch me that live rat,” commanded Mr. Burton. “Red doesn't think I'll bite its ass.”
The grinning black Platoon Sargent of Echo Troop's internal infantry platoon walked over and picked up the wooden rat trap. “Let's take this outside boys,” he said loud enough to insure that every Lobo aviator in the club was alerted to the upcoming event.
As the entire contents of the Officers Club spilled out through the sandbag framed door and past the banana trees onto the perforated steel plank covered flight line, Mr. Burton thought of Beowulf from English Literature class at the University of New Mexico. “They were brave under their helms,” he said. Had he completed college he would be a Real Live (commissioned) Officer rather than a lowly warrant officer. But the war was winding down, and he had not been able to conceive of missing his generation's war.
“What's going on?” asked 1st Lieutenant Jeff Arzola as he joined his platoon leader.
“I love being a warrant,” answered Mr. Burton. “It really pisses RLOs like Cpt. Davis off. Why aren't you a gunny, young lieutenant?”
“I want to slug it out low level with you, Mr. Burton. Scout Pilot is the best job in Vietnam. 13”
“And the most dangerous,” finished Mr. Burton.
“In this corner,” announced Blue Mike, holding up the rat trap, “weighing in at eight pounds, is Ricky the Rat.” Yells, whistling and applause filled the flight line.
“And in this corner,” tipping his black Stetson cav hat toward Mr. Burton, “weighing in at eight pounds over Army Aviator limits is Bloody Burt.”
Mr. Burton walked over to the nearest Loach. The Light Observation Helicopter was parked in an L shaped revetment. He grabbed both a M60 barrel changing glove and the shelter half the torque used to cover his grenade box. He put the glove on, wrapped the shelter half around his body like Clint Eastwood's serape, turned, and slowly waltzed gunfighter style toward Ricky the Rat. Without hesitation he opened the dead fall, reached in, and grabbed El Ricardo. The hissing rat set its teeth firmly in the glove, neither letting go nor attempting escape. This gave Mr. Burton great access to the aforementioned area and his mission was completed with haste.
Never again would he be simply Mister Burton or even White, except to identify the Scout Platoon Leader. CW2 John Burton would forever be Bloody Burt. And Bloody Burt knew his Scout pilots, whether commissioned or not, would follow him anywhere.
. . . . .
“Lobo Two Niner, this is White. I've got a grass trail used by four individuals in the last six hours,” Mr. Burton radioed his high bird.
“Lobo White, this is Lobo Two Niner. You've got the tree line coming up at three, right?”
“This is White. Affirmative. I've got cloths drying here by the stream.”
“Clissshh. Clissshh,” Lobo 29 broke squelch twice indicating roger.
“I've got a campfire in the tree line with very recent usage.”
“Lobo White, Two Niner. Get your speed up.” CW2 Dave Trujillo didn't like his Scout to take chances.
“White. Wilco.” 13
“Lobo Two Niner, this is Rash Five Six on Victor. Over.”
Dave switched the transmitter selector knob to VHF. “Rash Five Six, this is Lobo Two Niner. Go.”
“This is Rash Five Six. I've been monitoring your Uniform. You're going to find some bad guys down there. I've got a stick of F Fours coming out of Ton Son Nuit in zero five. I'll put them in an orbit two miles west. Let me know when you need them.”
“Rash Five Six, Lobo Two Niner. Thanks. Out.” Dave switched his transmitter selector back to UHF.
“Two Niner, this is White. I've got a bunker complex. One with very recent usage has two foot overhead cover. My torque is going to put a super-bomb on it.” Mr. Burton was hovering over a sparsely vegetated area in the jungle.
“Go,” ordered the torque, Sp4 Larry Custer, as he pulled the pin on a concussion grenade that was attached to the M-60 machine gun ammo can filled with C-4 plastic explosive and dropped the assembly over the side. He always kept his microphone hot while they were on the deck working.
Even from the back seat of the Cobra gunship, 1200 feet above, Dave could see the Loach first nose over, accelerate quickly and then jump as the twenty pound super-bomb went off. He pushed the radio switch down one notch for intercom to his front seat co-pilot/gunner. “Call in the spots we have so far. The Old Man will want to get the Blues moving on this.”
“Lobo White taking fire, moving east.”
Larry, standing on the skid behind Burt and secured to the Loach with a monkey strap, pulled the pin on a red smoke grenade with his teeth so he could keep his machine gun oriented toward the jungle. He dropped the smoke.
“Lobo Two Nine is in hot.” From his continuous orbit around the Loach, Dave banked the Cobra steeply allowing the nose to fall through naturally. He put the pipper onto the red smoke spewing out of the smoke grenade and pressed the rocket button on the cyclic twice. Swish, swish, 13 two pair of 2.5” folding fin aerial rockets left the tubes. He made a slight adjustment with the cyclic and pressed the button again before breaking hard right to keep the Loach in sight.
On the break Lobo 29X, in the front seat of the Cobra, put the pipper in the movable gunners quadrant onto the mixture of red smoke from the smoke grenade and gray smoke from the rocket impacts. The electric over hydraulic turret under his seat aligned the mini-gun and grenade launcher with the target. He squeezed the six barreled mini-gun trigger sending 3,000 per minute 7.62mm NATO rounds, sounding not like machine gun fire but rather like paper tearing, into the target.
Greg switched to VHF. “Rash Five Six, this is Lobo Two Niner. Over.”
“Lobo Two Niner, Rash Five Six. Go.”
“Rash Five Six, do you have a visual on my rockets?”
“Lobo Two Niner, Rash Five Six. Affirmative. Over.”
“Rash Five Six, this is Lobo Two Niner. Go ahead and put your jets in. We will refuel and rearm, but another hunter killer team will be here in one zero. Over.”
“Lobo Two Niner, this is Rash Five Six. Wilco. You're going to get sixteen five hundred pounders on that bunker complex.”
“Rash Five Six, Lobo Two Niner. Thanks. That next pink team will give you a BDA. Out.” Dave switched to UHF.
“Lobo White, this is Lobo Two Niner. Come up. Over.”
“This is White. Wilco.” Mr. Burton began the climb to join the Cobra. The rushing noise of Larry's hot mike stopped. Burt keyed the intercom, “AFVN on the ADF. Do you want a Coke?”
“Sure,” answered Larry. He was sitting on the floor with his legs hanging outside. He leaned back and reached between the two pilot seats to grab the coke. He flipped the number four switch on his radio receiver box. Johnny Cash was singing 'Six days on the road and I'm gona make it home tonight.'
13 . . . . .
“What's up Al?” asked Mr. Burton as he entered the Operations Officer's hooch. He liked Cpt. Henry Capone because he flew xray with the Gun Platoon Aircraft Commanders as often as possible.
“Pull up a chair John. Drink?”
“Sure.” Mr. Burton sat in the plastic blow up chair as Al, nobody used his real name, mixed another Jack Daniels and Coke. The Army supplied fire-bases with eight feet by eight feet sling-loaded pallets of beer, whiskey and soda, but the selections of each were limited. “Thanks.”
“How many days on your short sheet?”
“Eight days and a wake up. I'm so short I'm stepping on my talywag now.”
“Is Lieutenant Arzola the best man to take the Scout Platoon?”
“I think so.”
“You've trained every Scout crew here, except for Mr. Turner from Apache Troop, right?”
“Right. They're all good troops,” returned Mr. Burton.
“We know they're excellent troops,” said Cpt. Capone. “We're proud of Lobo Scout's part in finding the NVA. The Division Commander has credited half of the First Cav's fire-fights as being started by the First of the Ninth Air Cavalry. Our spot reports are much more highly valued than agent reports, sniffer reports, or infant reports. And you've been shot down five times I hear?”
“Yes Sir. You were here for the last three. The C&C bird or one of the Lift Platoon Hueys always got us out real fast. And you remember Red getting Larry and me out on the ammo bay doors?”
“Sure.” answered Cpt. Capone. “The Old Man chewed him out for that. You know SOP is to keep the Cobra up over the situation to coordinate artillery, Tac Air, and guide Troop birds into the crash site?”
“Yeah, but it's nice to see any helicopter on short final when O'l Charlie's breathing down your neck.”
“That's why Red didn't get his wings clipped,” said Cpt. Capone. “The tactical situation is 13 always fluid. The same when you let your torque dismount and search that dead NVA Political Officer. The intelligence was excellent. We found out they were to be responsible for all resupply; nothing was to be expected down the Ho Chi Minh Trail for months. It was very interesting that all NVA units in the south were ordered not to shoot at helicopters. But you could have gotten Larry killed. You know that John?”
“I know the men trust me too much,” answered Mr. Burton. He thought of his men and how good they were with the Protected Hamlet campaign General Abrams was pushing. They took great risks by withholding fire until the probability of an individual being enemy was determined, even in free fire zones. Mr. Burton remembered taking every new pilot and torque out over the villages where all the men were skinny and bent over from years of toil. He told his crews that Charlie and the NVA were healthy, clean shaven with short hair, and muscular. Mr. Burton thought of the Political Officer, on the trail alone, that Larry had killed when returning fire. That brave courier had almost certainly committed suicide rather than be taken by an air cavalry snatch mission. Larry had commented on how clean and squared away he was.
“I've heard you've had family problems?”
“Yeah. My wife took off with a druggie from Albuquerque.”
“Mine too,” said Cpt. Capone. “She divorced me on the grounds of abandonment.”
“Mine too,” said Mr. Burton. Is that legal?”
“Sure is. That's what our liberal legal system thinks of duty, honor, country. We all went to flight school on orders to Republic of Vietnam. To get flight school everybody who wasn't RA had to sign Voluntary Indefinite papers. Anyone who volunteers can be charged with abandonment.”
“Hell of a thing,” said Mr. Burton.
“Hell of a thing,” returned Cpt. Capone. “I see you're going straight to Germany?”
“I used all my leave with the divorce.” Mr. Burton remembered trying to straighten things out on R&R in Hawaii and then, on leave, the trauma of court for both him and Sue. She had been 13 too young when they had married. He had been too young as the guest of honor at the shotgun wedding. She and her family had hated him for leaving the safety of ROTC and enlisting two years before graduation. And Zachary, the baby son he knew he would not raise; would he agree with the law and the media that his father had abandoned him supposedly to kill babies eight thousand miles away?
“You know what they say about old guys and new guys, John?”
“Old guys are dangerous because they're short and beginning to think they might just make it back to the world. New guys are dangerous because they don't know when not to engage,” Mr. Burton answered.
“We're going to make Lt. Arzola White when you DEROS. You know some pilots quit flying and just help around the TOC when they get real short.”
“Giving Jeff the Scout Platoon is a smart move,” answered Mr. Burton, “but I won't stop flying as long as any torque will climb in with me. It's my job.”
“That's fine John, just speed it up a bit. No more hovering over bunkers. OK?”
“I'll admit I no longer have the nerve to hover over a bunker, if you'll promise not to tell anyone.”
“That'll work,” answered Cpt. Capone smiling. “Thanks for coming by.”
“Gary Owen, Sir.” Mr. Burton stood and saluted.
“Gary Owen, Mr. Burton.” Cpt. Capone returned the salute then offered his hand.
. . . . .
“Taking fire!” Mr. Burton had heard the distinctive zhap, zhap, like someone slapping the thin magnesium skin of the Loach. “Lobo White, taking fire. Moving up the hill to the north.”
“Lobo Two One is in hot.” Cpt. Greg Jackson rolled the Cobra gunship past ninety degrees left bank and allowed the nose to fall naturally onto the red smoke grenade thrown from the Loach. Having only three months in country, this was his first mission as Aircraft Commander. With the pipper on the red smoke, wafting up through the trees, his right thumb pressed down twice on the rocket 13 firing button. He heard the swish, swish as the first two pair of rockets left the pods and he made a cyclic adjustment from their smoke trails before firing the third pair and breaking hard right just a hundred feet above the trees.
Bump, bump, bump, bump went the slow cadence of the 40mm grenades leaving the short barreled chunker at the rate of 300 rounds per minute. As CW2 Jim Stokes, in the front seat of the Cobra, watched the individual grenades descend toward the smoking jungle he saw flaming green softballs rising up past the grenades. “Crap, that brother has a fifty caliber.”
“You think our Victor Charlie is black, Jim?” asked Greg.
“No I just think he is socially discriminated against on account of his condition of prior servitude.”
Dzeroo, dzeroo, dzeroo, dzeroo, went the Loach's low rotor RPM audio as the red Master Caution light started blinking. Mr. Burton slammed the collective down to the stop, taking all pitch out of the blades and entering auto-rotation.“Two One, White. I've lost the engine. Going down. Going down on the mountain.” He immediately turned to an opening in the scattered 200' trees called Loach Eaters. When under the sparse third canopy, he maneuvered into a single ship sized hole in the otherwise solid second canopy. As he pulled back the cyclic to flair he saw the tall bamboo that had looked like tall grass from one hundred feet. “Shit,” he said to Larry on the hot microphone, “hang on.” Burt delayed initial pitch a bit to compensate and then pulled the collective to the stop to further slow the rapid descent, knowing he had flared too high. The short three bladed rotor ran out of sufficient turns five feet down into the twenty feet high bamboo causing the Loach to fall the rest of the way to the jungle floor.
“White, this is Two One. Over. Lobo White, this is Two One. Over.” Greg relaxed the mike button to the first click for intercom, “Jim, get everybody moving. Use chunker on the breaks. Save the mini-gun. We may have to go low level to get them off Burt's back.” Greg rolled in on another rocket run, making his eye follow the fifty caliber tracers back down to the jungle. But the NVA gunner was smart enough to stop firing when he heard the distinctive whop, whop of the 13 Cobra's 540 rotor system in a steep turn.
Jim switched his transmitter selector to FM. “Lobo Ops, this is Lobo Two One Xray. Over.”
“Lobo Two One Xray, this is Lobo Operations. Over.”
“This is Two One Xray. White is down. Grid Alpha November 563728. We lost him in a single ship LZ. Get Med Evac and the Blues on the way. We have thirty minutes fuel remaining. How copy? Over.” Jim was an old guy, about to make Aircraft Commander. He knew to keep one finger on the military grid reference system topographical map at all times. That way he had coordinates, either for his downed low bird or to shoot artillery, when he needed them most.
“Lobo Two One Xray, this is Lobo Six.” Major Kinard, in the TOC, had taken the phone style microphone/receiver. “The Blues and the rest of the troop will be there in one zero. I will call Med Evac and Tac Air. Keep me posted. Out.”
Mr. Burton awoke smelling fresh cut bamboo and jet fuel. The low rotor RPM audio was still screaming in his helmet. Breathing hard he yelled into his helmet microphone, “You OK Larry?” With shaking hands he swung the cam arm releasing his seat belt and shoulder harness. He reset the low rotor RPM audio and turned the fuel off. The Loach was at a forty five degree angle and would roll down the hill except the bamboo was holding it in place, like strings suspend models from the ceiling. He spread the dense one inch diameter bamboo with his Nomex gloved hands, pushing toward his torque's station in the back of the Loach. He suddenly froze holding two spread bamboo spears.
“White, Two One. Are you OK? Over.”
Mr. Burton's helmet was still plugged in. Larry appeared to be standing but he was just supported by the bamboo and his monkey strap. His Mickey Mouse eared helmet was on but his face was not there. His Nomex pants were completely covered in blood. Mr. Burton unhooked his own helmet cord and pushed through the bamboo. He pressed his finger into Larry's neck where he thought the jugular should be. No pulse. He slid Larry's grenade box and M-60 out onto the mashed bamboo and, after removing his monkey strap and chicken plate, he carefully laid him on the bloody, inclined 13 floor of the Loach. He heard a mortar round impact two hundred meters to the east.
“White, this is Lobo Two One. Over.”
Mr. Burton pushed back through bamboo to the pilot's station, re-hooked his avionics cord and pulled the microphone switch past the first click to the fully depressed radio position, “This is White, L..Larry's dead! Have you got a visual on me Two One? Can you see Charley? Where are the bad guys? They have a mortar.”
“I've got you White. The Blues and the whole troop have bounced. Blues are ten minutes out. How steep is it? Can you see how high the bamboo is?” Greg keyed the intercom to his xray, “We've got to settle John down, keep him calm. I'm going to make a low pass over the swath he made in the bamboo. See if you can get a visual on him.”
“Two One, White. They have a mortar. Can you see them? It's really steep here. The Blues will have to rappel. Triple canopy except for this one ship hover hole. I'm in twenty feet high bamboo. I got careless Greg. I..I shouldn't have slowed down over them. Larry is dead.”
“This is Two One. I'm on the mortar,” answered Greg as he rolled in on another large muzzle flash in the jungle. “I saw the flash. Another round coming. The nearest bad guys are half a click down the hill below you.”
Mr. Burton heard the impact of the mortar round. It wasn't close but he felt totally immobilized by the bamboo curtain. He could see the blue sky through the hole he had made but his forward visibility was five feet, like flying in a heavy rain. He remembered an infantry instructor at Basic talking about 'find them, fix them, and finish them.' Mr. Burton felt very fixed. He knew that if the NVA could find him, they would finish him. He pulled the Velcro straps away and let his chicken plate drop to the ground between two bamboo poles.
“Lobo Two One, this is Lobo Red. I have you in sight. Which way do you want the Blues to approach from?”
“Red, this is Two One. Have them circle round and come down the mountain from 13 the north. Twenty foot bamboo, they'll have to rappel. There is a fifty caliber and a mortar five hundred meters south of White. You can't see White but you can see the hole he made in the bamboo.”
“Lobo White, this is Red. Pop smoke. Break. Two One, I'm in a left orbit behind you. Expend and then fuel and re-arm at An Loc. Lobo One Eight will meet you there. I have a visual on the hole in the bamboo. Break. Lobo One Six, do you have a visual on White?”
“This is One Six. Talley ho White.”
“Red, this is White. Smoke out.” Mr. Burton waved at the Loach over him just above the bamboo. He pulled the pin and threw the yellow smoke. As the released spoon sprang off and followed the grenade into the seemingly endless crop of bamboo, he wondered if the Blues would be able to see the smoke.
“Red, Two One. Wilco. I'm in hot. I'll break south out of the way.” Greg switched the rocket selector from pairs to salvo as he rolled in and put twelve remaining rockets between the enemy's last known position and White's position. Jim expended the chunker on the break.
“Lobo White, this is Lobo Red. I have a cav yellow smoke.”
“This is Lobo White. That's affirmative, Red, cav yellow.”
“This is Red. Heads up White. Lobo Three Three is approaching from the north. Break. Three Three, go to the deck, heading one eight zero. I'll call the flair. Over.”
“Lobo Three Three. Wilco.” CW2 Frank Arzola took one last look at the yellow smoke rising out of the second canopy and then pushed over taking the Huey to treetop level at one hundred knots weaving just a bit to miss the Loach eaters. His crew chief on the M-60 door gun leaned over and yelled to Blue, “fifteen seconds.”
“Lobo One Six, this is Lobo Red. Stay down the hill. Break. Three Three flair in three, two, one, flair.”
Mr. Burton was very relieved to hear the distinctive whop, whop, whop whop of the Huey's semi-rigid, two bladed main rotor. He looked up to see the skids and belly of the lift ship as 13 Frank stood it on its tail to decelerate and then leveled to a forty feet hover over him. The door-less Huey petal turned ninety degrees right to align with the hover hole and four Blues jumped from each side. They swung under the belly of the fat Huey, as the slack came out of their ropes, and rappelled into the bamboo.
“Lobo Red, this is Three Three. We took fire from that fifty. I'm in the trees now.”
“Three Three, Red. I've got a visual on him. I'm in hot. Wait.” Cpt. Davis fired five pair of rockets into the area where he had seen the muzzle flash. “We've got Div Arty and Tac Air lined up to go in as soon as you finish there,” he said on the break above the paper tearing sound of the mini-gun. “Get up to three thousand and hang out until the Blues get a LZ cut. Over.”
“Three Three. Wilco.”
“Bloody Burt,” yelled Blue grinning, as he released his caribiner and began hacking away at the bamboo with his machete.
Sp5 Joe Baldinado, the Blue's medic, unhooked and immediately went to Larry. While checking his pulse at the neck, Baldy noticed blood still oozing from Larry's face and that he was red not blue. “Larry is going to make it,” he said. “Burt you've got to learn how to land these things.” He used his scissors to cut Larry's pants open and check his leg wound. “I just need to debride and tie off a couple of bleeders. Larry can you talk?”
Larry made a gurgling noise.
“You're doing good son,” Baldy said as he put a large compress bandage on Larry's leg. He removed his own flak jacket and put it under Larry's head. “Keep your head sideways so you don't choke.”
Mr. Burton felt much better. With the adrenalin high and shock propelling him, he started tramping around the bamboo getting in the way. “I was sure I had killed him,” he told Blue. Seeing that Blue was busy, he stumbled over to Sgt. Becenti. “I was moving too slow, I thought Charlie got him,” he said. 13
The Blues grinned at Mr. Burton, but attended to the business of clearing the area uphill from the damaged Loach. They didn't have to be told that Frank would have to hover over the Loach so low that his rotor blades would almost hit the hill so that they might reach the skids of the Huey from on top of the Loach.
Blue grabbed the long corded telephone style microphone/receiver of the PRC-25 on Sp4 Little's back. “Lobo Red, this is Lobo Blue. I need Med Evac with the jungle penetrator to winch Larry and White out of here. Hold off the rest of my platoon. I don't have room for them down here anyway. Over.”
“Lobo Blue, this is Lobo Six,” broke in Maj. Kinard from his Command and Control Huey. “Med Evac is two minutes out. Blue Mike is headed to An Loc with the rest of your platoon. When Arty and Tac Air are finished we'll put you and your platoon in on the fifty cal and mortar site. Red got the fifty. If you haven't had any more mortar rounds, Two One probably got the mortar. I think they're bugging out by now. First of the Seventh is your ready reaction force. Out.”
Mr. Burton was surprised to see a medic riding the penetrator down with the litter basket hanging from the penetrator leg between his legs. The black medic immediately went to Larry and Baldy at the Loach. After he had put an IV in Larry, and Baldy had helped him load Larry in the basket , he approached Mr. Burton and looked directly into his eyes.
“How are you doing Mr. Burton?” he asked.
“I'm doing great,”Mr. Burton said even though his head was now pounding and his right arm and right ankle were throbbing.
“You're next. Don't try to help. I'm going to splint your leg and arm on the way to Ninety Third Evac,” the Spec 4 said as he grasped the returning penetrator.
The penetrator was bobbing up and down while the specialist folded the three legs out. Baldy had to give Mr. Burton a push as he put one and then the other leg over two of the penetrator's legs and then crossed his legs under the third. 13
“Don't grab the penetrator,” said the specialist as he cinched the safety belt. He pumped his arm up and down rapidly to signal his crew chief to winch Mr. Burton up.
As he was being winched up over the trees away from the bamboo and the Blues, Mr. Burton could see Hunter Killer teams not only working the fifty site but also west, east, and up the mountain from the crash site. Rising further he saw Nui Ba Dinh, Black Virgin Mountain, and out into flat and open Cambodia where he knew the Mekong flowed. And then they were pulling him into the fat belly of the Huey. He took one last look knowing he would never see this again.

Zzz wrote:I love old guy stories, but I fear the best will only ever be heard around a campfire. There is much prudence to be exercised in posting some stories to the Internet, at least if you're still exercising your pilot privileges.

Oh no worries there. Grandpa hasn't flown since '92, and that hardly counts since it was noting more than getting his Chrysler airborne a few dozen meters off a small yacht while en-route to the liquor store.

I know someone who with 5 other planes flew through the gateway arch. I would love to hear the whole story but about all one can get is that it was done and only on of them where caught.

The posts that prompted Cameron to start this thread were about a gentleman named Al Fleener. Al was a long time FAA Maintenance Inspector in the Anchorage FSDO. He was also the most practical minded Inspector I ever ran into. He was also a hell of a pilot, even though his left arm had been amputated just below the elbow. And, no, he didn't use any prosthetics to fly.

There is a huge number of field approvals in Alaska with Al's signature on them. If a mechanic went to Al with a proposed field approval and it seemed logical to Al, he signed it. That was it.

I once bought a set of PeeKay B2300 floats for my Cessna 170. After installation, I did a maintenance test flight to check rig, etc. I noted that the airplane was pretty unstable in yaw......in fact it was just about as happy flying sideways as straight ahead. I called Alton, the owner of PeeKay and asked about that, and he noted the floats were approved without a ventral fin, but the STC included a ventral fin as an option. I ordered one from Alton. Then I actually read the STC......and I noted that it was signed off by.....Al Fleener.

That brought a big smile to my face......Al had the philosophy that, while the airplane was a little unstable in yaw, it was in fact the pilot's job to actually fly the airplane.....and the airplane was fully equipped with rudder pedals. Install a fin if you'd like, but.....

As the FAA management became more and more "field approval averse", Al's willingness to field approve modifications that made sense drew some ire from management. Nevertheless, Al continued to sign field approvals that seemed logical.

Al retired from the FAA quite a few years ago. But, so many mechanics and pilots who knew him still recall fondly his friendly "get it done" attitude, and his willingness to share his vast knowledge of what works and what doesn't, especially to those of us who were getting started in our flying careers.

There were and still are great people in aviation. I've been fortunate to know some of those folks, and been blessed to have some of them as mentors. Al was one of those, no doubt.

MTV

cstolaircraft wrote:I know someone who with 5 other planes flew through the gateway arch. I would love to hear the whole story but about all one can get is that it was done and only on of them where caught.

That reminded me of this guy.

I bet that guy doesn't fuss about using rudder only for longitudinal alignment on final.

Lots of room!!! [emoji1]

Once we get our swath height established, it is important to concentrate on the poles not the wire, er structure.

Cannon wrote:

cstolaircraft wrote:I know someone who with 5 other planes flew through the gateway arch. I would love to hear the whole story but about all one can get is that it was done and only on of them where caught.

That reminded me of this guy.

It was done by the pilot of an ME 109 during WW II. But he did it to try and shake the US pilot flying a P-51 who was right on his tail. It didn't work.....the Mustang driver flew under the tower, then shot the German down.

MTV

Thanks for more of the backstory, MTV!

I have thoroughly enjoyed reading all these posts!



Z,
I realize some stories are best left to the campfire, I was looking more for the ones beyond any statute of limitations (like Hammer's about Grandpa) or ones about people like MTVs.

Not necessarily stuff about 4g negative dives