162nd AHC History - Year 1970

This amounted to roughly 4000 men and some 500 aircraft.

Although there were only three US Army airfields in the Delta to cover a vast region, the 164th Aviation Group (the Delta Group), which had responsibility for all army aviation in the Delta, had previously established (unmanned) POL refueling points at 15 regional capitals and major towns. These were strategically located throughout the region so that no aircraft would ever be more than 20 minutes or so from a refueling point. This provided aviation units with a great deal of flexibility and allowed them to provide excellent support to ARVN units anywhere in the Delta. At times during the 70-71 period there were two additional assault units assigned to the 164th Group and supporting Delta operations from the Dong Tam airfield. These were the 135th AHC (Emu's) and 335th AHC (Cowboys).

At this point US aviation units were very active throughout the area and pretty much "owned" the Delta. They provided very effective support to the ARVN ground troops. In fact, it was a rare occasion when aircrews from the Delta Group did not account for more enemy casualties in the weekly casualty reports than the ARVN troops they supported.

Although all major US army infantry and other combat units were out of the Delta by mid-1970 there were still quite a few US troops in the area in addition to the aviation units. These took the form of a variety of US engineer, signal, transportation, Special Forces and MACV advisory units.

On January 5th a Copperhead fire team was providing gun cover for a slick spraying Agent Orange along a canal near an ARVN compound west of Vinh Long. The slick began receiving fire and the Copperheads started a gun run. Cpt Frank H. Brinson, the gun platoon leader, was almost immediately hit in the throat by a round that severed a main artery. The pilot, WO Lawrence McGlamery, took over and headed for the hospital at Vinh Long using every ounce of torque he could pull while the CE and gunner tried to give Cpt Brinson first aid. He by-passed the helipad, flew underneath some power lines and right up to the back door of the Emergency Room. Unfortunately, they could not stop the bleeding and Cpt Brinson died before they made it to the hospital. WO McGlamery had flown the C model so hard that he overheated the engine and it had to be changed.

WO Edward B. Melody, in country only 2 months, was killed on February 23rd as pilot of a slick accompanying a Copperhead fire team on a Last Light Recon south of Can Tho near Phung Hiep. The AC, Cpt Matt Fleming, was flying in a right orbit at 1500 feet and WO Melody was looking out the window at the ground. Suddenly an RPK opened up from somewhere below and a round hit WO Melody in the right eye, killing him instantly. It was the only round to hit the ship.

Early in the year there was an interesting incident when a Copperhead fire team was covering Vulture slicks on a CA. WO Jim Willard was PIC of one gunship, and Cpt Walt Stewart was fire-team leader with WO Al Olbeter on the Chunker in the other. After they had escorted the slicks into a fairly large LZ s, as was typical in the Delta, they broke off to provide area security to the ground troops (21st ARVN Division). As luck would have it, they spotted a VC up in a tree (about ½ mile from the ground troops) taking in the scene. Of course, this was a door-gunner's dream! As WO Willard's gunner was working over the VC (his aircraft was about the height of the tree, slow, and about 20 feet away), Cpt Stewart suddenly saw an M-16 come up out of the grass directly under Willard's ship and open up on full automatic into the bottom of the aircraft.

Cpt Stewart shouted into the radio for Willard to get out of there - that he was taking fire. Of course, he knew that already because the lower pilots door hinge was shot away, with metal fragments cutting into his leg (he continued with the mission). The gunships immediately rolled in with 40mm and door guns. A 40mm round must have impacted under the VC that shot at WO Willard's ship since the explosion threw him several feet into the air. It was almost as if the scene was in slow motion. For a moment, Cpt Stewart thought the VC was coming through the windshield. Later when the troops made a sweep through the area, they found eight dead VC, all within a close radius of the tree. One of the US advisors saved an SKS rifle for the Copperheads, and it was later presented to Major Loveless when he left the company.

In the February-March time period a rather bizarre event occurred at Can Tho one day. A Copperhead gunship was refueling at the POL area when a spark apparently launched one of its rockets (with a white phosphorus warhead). The rocket went straight down the runway and into the ammo dump across from the airfield tower. It was a perfect shot! The dump exploded in a tremendous blast that shook the entire airfield, killing several guards on duty, and blowing the windows out of the tower. There was nothing but small pieces left of the guards.

In late 69-early 70, the Copperheads spent a great deal of time operating out of Moc Hoa near the Cambodian border, including many night missions over the Plain of Reeds. Cpt Stewart recalls that night flights over the Plain were particularly tricky for them since they had such limited IFR experience. On dark nights there was absolutely no horizon and it was very easy to confuse occasional lights with stars-a great place to get vertigo! Luckily it was flat and if you were higher than 100 feet you wouldn't hit anything. All in all, it was a very lonely place and anyone there was usually the enemy.

Moc Hoa and the area around the Seven Mountains (Sisters) was Copperhead turf prior to the Cambodian Invasion in April 1970. During the invasion they worked around the Parrot's Beak and the Svay Reng area inside Cambodia. They ran routine missions out of Moc Hoa patrolling the border on the southern edge of Parrot's Beak (the beak is that "beak" looking projection of Cambodia located between IV and III Corps, with the point of the beak looking toward Saigon).

A typical mission was for one or two gunships and a C&C/flare ship, to stage out of Moc Hoa, and at various times during the night to link up with an OV-1 and Delta Control to recon the northern portion of the Plain of Reeds. The Copperheads also provided on-call support to the Special Forces outposts along the border-the B Team was based in Moc Hoa. The OV-1 would often pick up something on its radar, relay the coordinates to Delta Control, and they would vector the Copperheads over the site. (It was here that the Copperheads learned an OV-1 was great at finding herds of water buffalo.) In any case, it was a dangerous area and dangerous mission. The American and Vietnamese troops who manned the string of outposts along the border had a lonely and dangerous job. As the time approached to go over the border, the Copperheads began to work around the clock - patrol the border from a line north of Moc Hoa west to Chau Doc and then back again. Once in a while as far south as the Seven Mountains area.

On one occasion the Copperheads were sent out from Moc Hoa in the early morning to look for a battalion of NVA that had come off the mountains. They found them, or at least they found each other! The NVA had at least one heavy machine gun and made the mistake of opening fire too soon. As Cpt Stewart recalls they expended their rockets (WO McGlamery was wing) and gave some instructions to an AH-1 team that followed them in. Unfortunately, the NVA gunners got the range on the Cobras and killed the front seat pilot in one of the aircraft.

On another occasion when operating out of Moc Hoa, Cpt Stewart recalls that engineers were replacing PSP matting with the new square mats. A large, unsecured section of matting was picked up by the rotor wash of the aircraft as he was trying to get off the ground (remember, fully loaded C models would not hover!). The tips of the skids slid under the mat section just as they reached translational lift, the cross tubes gave way and the entire skid assembly was pushed up against the bottom of the aircraft - the first, and only, retractable gear UH-1C. They flew the aircraft back to Can Tho, dropped two fully loaded XM200 rocket pods in the river, and landed on some mattresses that maintenance had set up. Somewhere in the Mekong, off Can Tho, are two surprise packages, compliments of the Copperheads and the engineers at Moc Hoa.

In early 1970, WO Geoffrey McConnell and WO Bob Good were on a defoliation mission (or Autumn Mist as they were called) west of Can Tho. They were to spray trees along a canal and had a gunship escort since the VC/NVA typically shot at any low level ships rigged for spraying. Shortly after commencing their run there was a loud explosion underneath the ship and it ballooned up from the concussion of the blast. At first they thought the Copperhead escort had fired a rocket too close but then realized that was not the case. The VC had apparently wired mines into the treetops as a defense against defoliation runs by helicopters and had detonated one as the Autumn Mist ship flew over. The ship limped back to Can Tho and maintenance counted over 60 holes from shrapnel and bullets. WO Good said he felt like one of those damaged B-17's limping back to its base in England during World War II.

On April 25th, a Copperhead fire team was working an area southwest of Can Tho. WO Gerard F. O'Connor and WO Dennis W. Stoner in 66-15214 were on a gun run when the aircraft inexplicably crashed pulling out of a dive after firing rockets. WO O'Connor died in the crash and the rest of the crew were severely injured. Both pilots' armored seats were ejected from the aircraft in the crash. WO Stoner ended up with his legs jammed into the mud of a rice paddy (one leg was severely broken in several places) with the pilot's seat on top of him and pinning him to the ground. The main body of the aircraft was several feet away and caught fire almost immediately. The CE (SP4 B. Potteroff) had fuel splashed onto him in the crash and was badly burned from the waist up. The gunner (SP4 R. Volles) was not badly injured initially but incurred serious burns on his hands as he tried to extinguish the flames on the CE's body. Fortunately, the C &C ship landed within a few minutes, freed WO Stoner and took the group to the Binh Thuy Hospital.

The company later received a letter from WO O'Connor's parents asking about a tape recorder that he used to exchange messages with his parents. It was packed up with his gear and shipped home but lost somewhere along the line. His parents desperately wanted it because they thought it might contain one last taped message from their son. It was heart-breaking a tragedy!

When the Copperheads were finally allowed to cross the Cambodian border in April they were a bit disappointed. Most of their time was spent destroying watercraft and supplies. It was almost as if the NVA knew they were coming. Cpt Stewart recalls finding a beautiful cabin-type boat, maybe 30' long, and probably used by VIPs. In his words, "I shot one rocket at it and missed. By the time I came around for another try, my wing (WO Steve Behm) had reduced it to splinters on the water. We shot-up hundreds of small watercraft and destroyed untold amounts of supplies. There were numerous secondary explosions from door guns - a target rich environment - but the enemy had obviously pulled out fast."

Cpt Bill Tuttle had the distinction of being the one of the first US troops in Cambodia-at least officially. He was flying a 2 ship Nigthhawk mission out of Moc Hoa supporting the ARVN 11th Armored Calvary when that unit jumped the gun and crossed the border on the evening of April 30th. It immediately ran into the 17th NVA Division and had a real fight on its hands. Cpt Tuttle did a night medivac in monsoon conditions and under heavy enemy fire in an attempt to save a US advisor who had life threatening wounds. Cpt Tuttle's brand new Peter Pilot on his first in-country mission, turned the landing light on as they landed and attracted a hail of enemy fire. This act inadvertently allowed a second ship to land and rescue the badly wounded advisor. Luckily, they all made it out without any casualties although Cpt Tuttle did have a few choice words with his copilot.

After US forces left Cambodia (the ARVNs stayed for a while), the Vultures and Copperheads shifted focus to the east - toward the area around My Tho, and got back to small unit actions. Part of this action included an occasional search for POW camps (that might hold two OV-1 crewmen captured in the area when their aircraft went down in late 1969). These missions would usually follow some intelligence report and involved 3-4 slicks, an ARVN platoon, a C&C ship and a Copperhead fire team. They managed to find two camps, one that had been recently vacated and one where the prisoners (roughly ten ARVNs and civilians) had been executed just prior to the search team's arrival. This was somewhere northeast of Can Tho, the other was close to an abandoned airfield, probably Japanese, near the coast - east of Ben Tre. However, at the occupied camp, the Copperhead gunners did kill some of the guards and the ground troops got a few more of them. There were no US troops among the dead POWs. It was learned much later that one of the OV-1 crewmen died in an escape attempt and one lived to be released.

After Major Beauchamp assumed command in April, he learned that the barracks and other facilities being built for the 162nd were to be given to a Chinook outfit (the 271st ASHC) instead. This not only meant the Vultures would have to live in tents 4-5 months longer than anticipated but also the company buildings would have to be constructed by the men of the 162nd with little outside help. For months every available man was diverted to construction work.

When the 162nd first moved to Can Tho they had dragged a number of two and a half ton trucks and other vehicles down from Dong Tam and put them in the motor pool to be cannibalized for parts. Like other AHC's the priority was on aircraft maintenance and no one paid much attention to the seldom used ground vehicles. However, the army did! Someone in DOD came up with the idea that combat units should have maintenance inspections. The Vultures had a CMMI (Command Maintenance Management Inspection) in the midst of the construction of the company buildings. The aircraft maintenance and weapons systems passed but the motor pool failed.

The CMMI failure almost cost Major Beauchamp his head. That mysterious black CH-47 that roamed around Vietnam in the dead of night plucking unit commanders who run afoul of headquarters almost came after the CO. However, he was saved when the battalion commander intervened on his behalf. After much hard, but rather useless, work and sleight of hand by the motor pool NCO, the Vultures passed a re-inspection of the motor pool. Priorities were sometimes a little strange!

An interesting task that the Vultures and Copperheads greatly enjoyed in 1970 was the Phoenix missions-a CIA sponsored operation aimed at capturing or eliminating high level VC cadre. The Phoenix missions were based on superb intelligence, and that was how the size of the force package was determined. At times it was a CA but mostly it was a single slick with one or two gunships. The Phoenix "snatches" were generally focused, surprise attacks - a slick might land four or five heavily armed men at the door of a particular hooch, and in they went. There was one case where the Special Operations men talked a 162nd slick into hovering over a hooch so they could jump directly through the roof. While the ship was at a hover the object of the mission came out the front door and gave the aircraft a burst from his AK. It was all down hill from there - but with a happy ending. Violent in execution, short in duration, and surprisingly free of friendly and enemy casualties, the Phoenix raids were a unique and highly effective brand of offensive operations. The Vultures and Copperheads loved them.

On May 27th, SP4 Andrew P. Susi, a Vulture crew chief on WO Mike Coonrod's ship, was killed on a CA southeast of Can Tho in the "Mickey Mouse's Ears" area. This was a very prominent series of bends in the river that looked just like Mickey Mouse ears from the air. A lift of ARVN troops were inserted into one of the "ears" into what turned out to be an ambush. The Copperheads covering the lift ships had recommended the LZ be moved but the Vietnamese province chief in the C&C ship insisted the LZ be right in the "ear". As soon as the slicks touched down the entire LZ lit up with automatic weapons fire. The ARVNs were cut to pieces but all the Vulture ships managed to make it out of the LZ. On the way out, SP4 Suzi was hit in the head by a single round. He made it back to the hospital in Can Tho but died the next day. The copilot, Lt William Healy, was also wounded but not seriously. There was suspicion of collusion between the ARVN province chief and the VC but no one ever knew the whole story.

One day in midyear WO Willard and Cpt Stewart were cruising along in their gunships at tree-top level heading to Ca Mau when they suddenly broke over 20 to 30 NVA troops bathing in a stream. As can be imagined, it was bare asses running all over the place and the CE/gunners asking if they should shoot (maybe that American sense of fair-play!). WO Willard and an NVA soldier (who had made it to his AK) dueled it out. He would shoot at Willard with the AK, Willard would shoot a rocket at him, and so on. WO Willard won the contest on the third or fourth rocket.

Another interesting incident happened around midyear. The CO went on R&R and left the most senior Captain, a platoon leader, as acting commander. The Platoon Leader had been in country a couple of months and figured he was about ready for AC, so he cut orders appointing himself as an Aircraft Commander. On his first day flying as AC he was supposed to land at the Binh Thuy Navy field. He was talking to the Binh Thuy Navy tower but shot his approach to the Binh Thuy Air Force Base. Unfortunately, he cut off an F-4 flown by a full colonel on final approach and that was the end of his AC days for a while!

In the 70-71 period the company had a slick painted flat black (to cut down on shine and glare in the moonlight). It was equipped with a zeon light panel on the right side of the cargo compartment with 7 large zeon bulbs. The ship would fly at night into suspected areas of enemy activity looking for lights or fires. It would then light up the area and call in gunships to see if they could draw fire. If so, they would unload on the target. The zeon ship was almost always flown by CW2---- Smith?, an experienced pilot who had been in country over 2 years.

June 1970 was a sad month for the 162nd. On June 20th a Copperhead fire team on a recon mission took fire from a hooch in a small clearing surrounded by tall trees. They returned fire and set up for a rocket run but the trees obstructed their angle of attack. WO Alex Spence, the aircraft commander, then began a rocket run at a steep angle so as to be able to get a clean shot at the hooch. However, for some unknown reason he did not pull out of the dive and the ship (65-09454) hit the trees, rolled over and exploded. WO Spence, the pilot (WO Robert F. Colatruglio) and CE (SP4 Joseph P. Lutz) were killed on contact but the gunner, PFC Gary Catlett, survived with serious injuries. He escaped from the crash and a nearby slick dropped a rope and carried him to a clearing where they put him on board and took him to the hospital. He was medivac'd back to the US. The cause of the crash, whether it be enemy fire, target fixation, or something else, could not be determined.

Three days later on June 23rd, a slick (67-17594) with a Vietnamese woman and 7 Navy passengers on board departed Ca Mau at around 1800 hours for Can Tho. Roughly 5 minutes later at an altitude of 1,500 feet the mast apparently snapped off just below the rotor head assembly. Subsequent investigation revealed that "mast bumping" had occurred. A heart-breaking 12 souls were lost in this unthinkable accident, with 3 members of the crew being 20 years old or younger. The crewmembers were WO Daniel J. Hallows (AC), WO Lawrence M. Moore (pilot), SP5 Denis J. Dillon (CE) and PFC James W. Lenz (gunner). May God bless them all. From the nature of the weapons recovered it appears the passengers may have been SEALS or part of the CIA Phoenix program.

One day around mid-year, the 162nd planned a company party and the flight platoons had been able to return from a CA a little early in anticipation of the party. One of those engine shipping containers was filled with ice and beer. Everyone had had a few beers and were standing around waiting for the steaks to cook when the Operations Officer came running over to the group. He said a loach had been shot down and they needed to insert some troops asap. Then he turned to the first platoon leader, Cpt Bill Howell, and asked how many of his crews were ready. Cpt Howell immediately answered "all of them". At that point the entire first platoon headed toward the flight line, running, staggering and falling all over each other like a scene from the Keystone Cops. However, once they made it to the aircraft, they quickly sobered up and it was all business. They picked up and inserted the troops but were not able to rescue the loach crew. The VC had beat them to it.

One day in mid-1970, WO Robert Good was AC of a slick that had an engine failure south of Can Tho. The ship was empty and he made an autorotation into a flooded rice paddy, setting the aircraft down with no damage. WO Good had put out a May Day call that was picked up by a medivac ship not far away. There was no dry ground where they landed so WO Good put a smoke grenade on the synchronized elevator of the ship to signal the pick up ship. When the aircraft was sling-loaded back to Can Tho, WO Good was there when the CO came by to take a look a it. Although there was no damage and he had made a great autorotation, Major Moore saw where the smoke grenade had scorched the sync elevator and had a fit. He chewed WO Good out-for damaging the ship. It was hard to please a perfectionist!

Sometime in August of '70 the SEALS and MACV were searching for a VC/NVA POW camp in the U Minh Forest area. They had carried out several Sniffer missions and confirmed a great deal of human activity in the area. One day the Vultures took part in an ARVN six-ship, no-prep raid in the U Minh about half way between Ca Mau City and Rach Gia in an effort to surprise and overrun a suspected POW camp. They landed and stayed in place instead of pulling pitch and getting out. According to Cpt Bill Tuttle, "The local bad guys must have bugged out while we were enroute, because you could still smell the faint odor of wood smoke. The ARVN grunts found the compound underground-three stories, complete with a generator room, pumps, a decent-sized hospital, and a clothing and equipment manufacturing area with 50 Singer sewing machines, but no live POWs-just dog tags stuck in the walls. The VC had kept the guys in 3'x3'x5' cages dug into the sides of the tunnels, and when they died, they just collapsed each cage roof to bury them. They tamped the dirt down, then tucked their dog tag chains into the wall. Kind of reinforced your desire to go out fighting if you went down while flying single ship."

According to the briefing before the raid, there were supposed to be three confirmed US and 10-15 ARVN's being held in the POW camp. One of the US advisors who went down into the tunnels said they found five sets of US dog tags and "a lot" of ARVN ID's on the second level and he had heard that there were more down on the third.

On August 26th the Vultures were on a CA supporting ARVN troops and were departing a hot LZ when the lead ship (69-15429, a brand new aircraft) was hit by an RPG at an altitude of about 200 feet. The aircraft exploded and all aboard were killed. The crewmembers were WO William H. Laurence (AC), Cpt Stephen D. Carr (pilot and first platoon leader), SP5 Benny R. Halstead (CE), and SP5 Larry B. Jacobson (gunner). It was WO Laurence's first flight after making AC and many remember how proud he was of that achievement. The CA was only 10-15 minutes from Can Tho and the Operations staff were listening to the radio traffic when the ship was hit. They were stunned by the news--to be so close yet so helpless. It was a sad loss!

In the August-September period the 162nd lost nine ships with engine failures. The third stage compressor blades were apparently faulty and that group of engines failed at around 1200 hours. WO "Tuna" Williams was lucky enough to be in on 3 of the engine failures.

In the fall of 1970 the 121st AHC and 336th AHC at Soc Trang began training Vietnamese air force (VNAF) personnel en masse to take over their function and subsequently turned their aircraft, equipment and facilities over to two newly formed VNAF squadrons. In the South Vietnamese armed forces all aircraft, including helicopters, were part of the air force and these two units had US air force rather than army advisors. Unfortunately, the advisors were mostly jet jockeys who had been through a 25-hour helicopter transition course and had no clue as to how to run air mobile operations and support ground troops. Soc Trang airfield was turned over to the Vietnamese air force and the remaining US troops either stood down or were transferred to Can Tho. The Vultures and Boomerangs at Can Tho ended up taking up some of the slack with the Tigers and Warriors gone.

One evening in the fall there was a USO show at the Officers Club. The 162nd crews were out on missions and arrived late for the show but quickly made up for lost time. Some of the men took to the stage and proceeded to help out the performers with singing and dancing. Major Beauchamps, the CO, got up to herd everyone back to their seats but ran into the Airfield Commander just entering the Club. Unfortunately, the Airfield Commander didn't appreciate the humor of the situation and reacted very negatively. He booted the Vultures out of the Club, telling them not to come back. It took a while for the CO to get back on speaking terms with the Airfield Commander.

Late in the year, SP4 Dan Pannunzio was CE of V369 on maintenance run to Long Binh. Although it was a little awkward they put a crated tail boom and transmission in the cargo area of the Huey and flew it back to Can Tho. Because of poor aerodynamics and wind resistance they had to stop to refuel at My Tho and Vinh Long. When the ship landed at the POL pad they jumped out, grabbed the fuel hose and then realized they couldn't access the tank because the open cargo door blocked it. They couldn't close the door because of the tail boom cargo and finally ended up getting a skinny-armed Vietnamese to reach between the fuselage and door to unlock the emergency window release. So much for using their head!

Shortly after assuming command of the 162nd in October, Major Moore ended a longstanding initiation rite for new pilots, much to the chagrin of some and the relief of others. The initiation usually took place late at night after most people were asleep. The "old-timers" would get together and go drag the unsuspecting "newbie" out of his hooch and hold him down on the ground while one of them dropped his underwear and sat on the face of the new guy. This procedure was known as the "Crack 6" and initiated all new pilots into the unit.

The wood, two-story barracks and other permanent facilities were finally completed in November and the company moved out of the tent city that had been home for the first 15 months at Can Tho. It was beginning to look a lot like a nice company area but when the monsoon rains came it was still a muddy mess in some areas. Unfortunately, the bunkers were built partially underground and no one considered what would happen in the rainy season. At that time of year the bunkers usually had about 2 feet of water in them. Some people simply got on top of the bunkers during mortar attacks with their cameras and tape recorders and tried to direct the VC fire to the ragged ships they hoped would be hit.

In early December, the Vultures and Copperheads were on a CA east of Can Tho. The LZ was full of water and the ships hovered over small raised islands so the ARVN's could jump off. Lt Ken Barnard was AC in one of the ships and they began taking heavy fire as they came into the LZ. The ARVN's would not get off so the CE was throwing them off. As the lead ship lifted out of the LZ, Lt Barnard saw a VC step out from behind some grass roughly 10-15 yards in front of his ship and aim his AK-47 directly at his copilot. Three rounds went through the right windshield and the VC then aimed at Lt Barnard. Six rounds went through the left windshield. Since the ship was hovering, it was above the VC and he had aimed too high. No one was hit. Lt Barnard then pulled full power and tilted the rotor forward at a sharp angle in an attempt to hit the VC with the rotor blade as he took off. However, the VC went completely underwater and was not touched. As they lifted out of the LZ they could see an ARVN with an M-60 dangling from the skid of the ship in front of them. He hung on until around 200 feet AGL and then fell into a rice paddy. Lt Barnard displayed the windshield in his hooch for weeks afterwards.

There was a sad event in the company on Christmas Eve. A gunner from one of the flight platoons, PFC Samuel E. Dick (20 years old) received a letter from his girlfriend informing him she had been on several "acid trips" with his friends back home and she didn't want to see him again. PFC Dick went to the arms room and told the armorer he wanted to clean his M-16. He took it back to his barracks, loaded it, put the barrel in his mouth and pulled the trigger. God rest his soul! He was just as much a casualty of the war as those killed by enemy bullets.

On December 27, the 162nd was on a CA in the Ca Mau area. A slick went down in the LZ and a Copperhead fire team covered it until the crew could be picked up. One of the gunships (66-15008, CE SP5 Curt Krouse) came under heavy fire and took roughly 10 hits. The gunner, Sgt Ames, was hit in the face with shrapnel and the AC , WO Bruce Bonner, had rounds go between his legs, into his seat and over his head but was not hit. They flew back to a staging area and shut down to check damage. After looking the ship over closely they reloaded and continued their mission, flying roughly 8 more hours that day. On arrival back at Can Tho, a maintenance inspection discovered some serious damage, including a swash plate push/pull tube that had been hit and half the diameter was missing -scary!! The ship stayed in maintenance for several weeks, had an engine failure on its first flight out and was destroyed.

(There may have been several Silver Stars or DFC's awarded for the December 27th incident. Can anyone provide more detail?)

Memorable Incidents

Other memorable incidents during 1970 include:
· Cpt Lonnie Ames, maintenance officer, was relieved for taking a shot at a hooch maid who stole his watch.

· SP5 Greg Price, a maintenance team chief, decided he'd like to fly and transferred to a flight platoon. His ship was shot down on his first flight out of Can Tho. SP5 Price figured that was enough flying for him and came back to maintenance.

· Lt Imanuel Sieving and his gunship crew were shot down near Moc Hoa one night around midyear. They landed on the bank of a canal and held off the VC until morning when they were rescued.

· The XO and 2nd platoon leader flying C&C were awarded a Silver Star for picking up the crew of a downed Copperhead gunship (WO Mike Perrin, WO Peter Lautzenheiser, SP4 Greg Boska and SP4 Leroy).

· WO "Tuna" Williams was flying a defoliation mission on Christmas Eve and forgot to switch radios when he tried to inform his accompanying gunships that he was taking fire. A slick 25 miles away responded "I don't give a damn, I'm not there."

· Lt. Guy Smith, son-in-law of then Secretary of State Dean Rusk, was wounded on a CA and Major Loveless had to call the State Department in Washington to explain the circumstances.

· Some of the Vultures took part in a SEAL raid where they grabbed a VC paymaster for the local VC battalion, complete with payroll. They all took some VC NLF "Liberation Money" as souvenirs.

· The 271st Innkeeper Chinook that picked up AC # 555 (a fully loaded gunship) downed upwind of a village on Go Cong Island dropped the gunship on takeoff. There was a TV crew from a major US network in the village at the time gathering "local color" footage and they scattered as a cloud of red smoke and CS gas drifted through the village. The Vultures heard about this for weeks.

· WO Dennis O'Brien had to write home to ask his parents for money to pay off his gambling debts so he could DEROS. He owed so much they wouldn't let him Vietnam without paying his debts (whoever he owed apparently could pull a few strings!).