Because the Director of Operations (DO) was leading a flight-of-four on MiG Cap hoping to shoot down a MiG. First of all, we only had three airplanes. Lockhart is still alive, although. I recommend . I imagined the instrument of death: a bullet, a knife, a shovel, hammer, pick, axe At that moment, I felt a long, cool piece of steel slide between my throat and my helmet strap. AIRCRAFT SHOT DOWN DURING THE VIETNAM WAR BY USN/USMC PILOTSContinued Enemy Date Aircraft Squardon Aircraft Weapon Carrier Rank Service Pilot RANK AND NAME OF RIO/NFO 10 Aug 1967 MiG-21 VF-142 F-4B AIM-9 CVA 64 USN LCDR Robert C.Davis LCDR Gayle O.Elie 26 Oct 1967 MiG-21 VF-143 F-4B AIM-7 CVA 64 USN LTJG Robert P. Hickey, Jr. LTJG Jeremy G.Morris Phew! I later learned that this controller had served many months in Saigon. It was a bittersweet event and Im so grateful I was able to attend. It was very kind of you to drive the 40 miles and spend the time to honor the memory of my brother, your fellow employee at Flying Tigers and FedEx. Glad you made it home safe after 6 years in the north. Your writing is superb and I wonder if you have considered writing a book about your experience in the USAF. North Vietnam, pre-1975: Killing of Two American Pilots Shot Down Over North Vietnam IIR Casualty files | William A. Ott. It was proving a good day for Navy Lt. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, and his back-seat. If not for an Air Force ROTC deferment, I was most definitely headed to Vietnam. Those bumps on the walls, in retrospect, were a poor mans acoustic treatment for trying to muffle the screams of Americans being tortured there. The last known photo of F-4C 64-0755, the Phantom flown in this article. After that, I was blindfolded and transported two miles by motorcycle sidecar to another village and locked in a small building made of large stones. Flight lead replied, Dogwood 2, you have the lead. So that it is crystal clear to the reader, this means that two 1stLieutenants were leading a flight of Phantoms to a JCS target on the outskirts of Hanoi referred to as Bullseye by those of us who flew over the north. I didnt know the Marine who was killed as he lit a cigarette on Iwo Jima any more than I knew Scotty Wilson, and yet, thanks to that brief story by my father, and thanks to a longer and more detailed story by Joe Crecca, I feel I do know these servicemen. Thank you, Joe. At 2,500 ft. First loss: 1964, final loss: 1967. Fogleman became the only Super Sabre pilot ever rescued by riding out on a Cobra helicopter. The Douglas A-1E Skyraider (U.S. Navy BuNo 132649) at the National Museum of the United States Air Force (Dayton, Ohio, USA) is the airplane flown by Maj. Bernard Fisher on 10 March 1966, when he rescued a fellow pilot shot down over South Vietnam in the midst of enemy troops. When naval aviator Porter Halyburton deployed for Vietnam, he left behind his young wife and five-day-old daughter, Dabney. 23 NOV 67. The Dash-1 (USAF How to Fly the F-4 book) technique to accomplish this feat was to have the control stick fully aft (T.O. I would spend the next six years and three months in five different prison camps around the city and countryside in North Vietnam; the farthest very near to the Chinese border. If you are wondering how this is possible, I will reveal at the outset that it is not possible. I was O.K. Japan, who woulda thunk it? I dont know that back in 1973 I was all that appreciative of the Scotty Wilsons, or even the cigarette-smoking Iwo Jima Marines, but as Ive grown and aged during the past 47 years, I cant help but feel enormous gratitude, and sorrow, for those men and women who, but for the grace of God and President Nixon, went where I didnt. I finally got him to talk and he said, Gary, it was just like Vietnam. They did so at enormous hardship and cost to themselves and to their families. I do not think that you are a hero.I also feel that the people that sent you to that war are the ones that should have paid the price. Thank You for your service. But, I stuck to my story answering the same question in the same way each time. Scotty compensated nicely and kept us in formation while I was continually checking six. During the left, 270 degree turn, the flight leader must have been having problems with his navigation system because he asked if our own nav equipment was operating normally, saying, Dogwood 2, hows your inertial?. Then, I was pushed face down to the floor and blindfolded. But, I knew the SA-2 was a powerful weapon; 400 lbs. [1], There were about 11,846 U.S helicopters that served in the Vietnam War. 2013. And the Officer Effectiveness Report (OER) of the guy leading our flight would be written by the DO. Owing to all the maintenance problems, we did not take off as a flight but departed single-ship and joined up on the KC-135 tanker aircraft over Thailand as a flight of three. Presently it dishonors over 50,000 dead and how many maimed and wounded? R.I.P Scotty. SMS D.R. I replied that I still had a positive lock to a radio nav-aid and if he could get us through the clouds I could get us to the target. Those of us that were there were paying attention; I remember that it was not assured, back then, if anybody would be repatriated. Had it not been for President Nixon and the sheer courage of the B-52 and tactical aircrews, the POWs would never have returned. Model names were normalized in 1962 to UH-1s. The claimed flying aces of the Vietnam War, pilots who shot down five or more enemy aircraft, include 19 North Vietnamese pilots (six MiG-17 and 13 MiG-21 pilots),[1]:228 and five Americans. b fearnits people like you ( and others who fled to Canada) who make those of us who answered the call sick to our stomachs! The Thud flights were all calling Outbound for WX but our FLs OER was going to be written by the guy on MiG CAP so in we went and we took a SAM from dead six with no RHAW gear. I flew Marine Corps F-4s out of Da Nang and Nam Pong, Thailand in 1972; unfortunately not much had changed in six years. Our flight should never have been going into the target. Thank you Sir for your service. * These two pilots shared the credit for the shoot down of the MiG-17 and each were credited for . I was escorted a few hundred feet to one of the village hooches Id seen from above. The ONLY bright spot is that so much sacrifice led to a new generation of officers who learned that the half-assed politically-correct application of military power accomplished nothing. Joe, Both were exactly right because the top of my parachute was practically in the bottom of the clouds right above me. u-6 losses need added all are army fixed wing aircraft, 5,195+ (which include not in addition to the above statistics)[2], North Vietnam captured 877 South Vietnamese aircraft at war's end. He wasnt much of a story teller and I didnt think to ask him about his service until after he died. As a 110 F4 combat mission Vet, Id like to know. You also draw a conclusion that isnt at all clear-cut, which is why no one else has commented on it. LTJG Hartman & LT Clinton B. . Since 366thTFW maintenance was overtaxed having to do all of its around-the-clock 24/7 functions, the flight leader had to turn down two airplanes before he found one that was combat ready and airworthy. He told me join up. By my count I was about the 335thPOW to walk up onto the stage to shake hands with the President. Thank you for the heads-up on the article. Number two is getting the shit shot out of him screaming on 272.7 and too late lead lights ABs as #2 blows up. Although thank you is not enough, I do thank you for your service. when the canopy rails are parallel to the ground, the nose is 10-12 degrees up. We can only hope that the current and subsequent generations will take J.S. Permission was granted and I promptly made a big hit with the youngsters in attendance. Our airplane flew out of the fireball with orange flames and thick, black smoke trailing from the wings, fuselage and tail. April 16, 1968 : C-130A 56-0480, c/n 3088, of the 35th Tactical Airlift Squadron, crash landed at Special Forces Camp Bunard, 80 kilometers north of Bien Hoa, South Vietnam. Jan 12, 06:12 PM. Despite my state of lingering shock, my reaction to his command was to pop the Rat and restart. You guys were working around the clock to keep the pressure on HCM. Nose wheel liftoff speed was calculated to be over 170 knots and liftoff at nearly 200 knots or 230 mph! In closing, I assert that Joe did not have the option you recommend. Without guys like Joe you would go to prison for writing what you just wrote. You certainly are my Hero! Our detachment was working on WWll vintage C-47s, but we got to observe AC-130 gunships and the F-4 unit known as Wolf-Pack in action. With over 70 years of hindsight and investigation there were a ton of mistakes. Scotty yelled, GET OUT! With the OUT still echoing in my ears there was a BOOM!, then the air noise of the jettisoned canopy. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing he values above his own personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of men better than himself.. May God continue to bless you. Thank you for your sentiment. I cried like a baby. [23] 2 Mi-4, 5 An-2, 5 Il-14, 1 MiG-15UTI, 1 Il-28, 1 L-29, 1 Lisunov Li-2 lost through all causes[24] Total: 159 aircraft and 2 helicopter lost. This farmer pilot is Nguyn Vn By who died on Sept. 21, 2019 at the age of 83. Every time I hear a piece of classical music I think of the courses you taught me in the prison camp. Crash Location: Into Sea off southwest coast of Vietnam near Rach Gia and Ca Mau. In that instant, I realized how I would die; they were going to slice my head off. Thanks for your service, Sir. Now I know a little bit more about what he did. Some were grabbing and pulling at my anti-g suit, flight suit and boots. It was late November, the temperature was 40F, and all I had on were my underwear. Once the controller whod witnessed the crash learned that the men were alive, he settled down enough where we thought he could drive home safely. Scotty was probably hit by shrapnel from the missile. Instead, dummy missiles had been placed at the site as a "flak trap.". I met and liked John Dremesi whose experience was the same as yours. Upon arrival at the Hoa Lo prison, I was placed in a dimly-lit room with light green, uneven walls. Jim Hestand the AC of the fateful flight gave the eulogy at Bobbys funeral! Vietnam will eventually strive throughout S.E. Im still honored to have flown a 10 day trip with you around Asia with FedEx. The White House approved a retaliatory air strike, but by the time it got there, the SAM batteries were long gone. Your story sheds much light on what his experiences must have been like. Sayonara, engines! Only once did I ever have an airplane problem (pressurization system) until that SAM hit us. On 27 July 1968, Commander Mongilardi was the pilot of an A4C Skyhawk that launched from the deck of the USS Coral Sea as the section leader in a flight of two on a armed reconnaissance/strike mission over North Vietnam. The bomb release button was now hot! Im sorry that you had to suffer so much but you had no business what so for ever being there. Jeffrey Ethell and Alfred Price wrote a great book about this day called "One Day in a Long War, May 10, 1972, Air War, North Vietnam" that describes in detail events of that day. Never regretted. We had been taught to respect and trust the higher-ups that won WWII, Little could we conceive that the USMC and the USAF began the conflict with almost total ignorance of what was required for this exercise in power projection. Of those servicepeople, 2,382 were killed while serving aboard UH-1 Iroquois, better known as the ubiquitous "Huey." Contents [ hide] Burning American aircraft at Bien Hoa Air Base in 1965. And Mr. Crecca, again, I thank you. Not sure which squadron he started with but he ended up assigned to the 366-tfw. SSGT Bobby Sacina, JoeThank you fot sharing your experience..We have had a few talks over beers in the past but you never told this storyYou are an American hero!! 1850 Good lives were wasted for what? Did a Korea tour also when enlisted. As for Mr. Fearn, Politics aside, we probably did back the wrong side. And when the pressurization system failed we were freezing our butts off! Just as we were positioning ourselves for the right-hand turn at Bravo, the lead aircraft unexpectedly turned to the left. Thank you for your sentiments. Only those who were there truly know! Hope you sre enjoying the golden years. How do you look in the mirror? Its a real shame but they ruined a perfectly good pair of nearly new, highly-polished USAF flying boots with zippers; they cut right through the damn zippers! But I promise if youll just give me another one, Ill take much better care of it. He squeezed my hand so hard I thought he was going to break all the bones in it as he said with great gusto, I want you in one!, The next evening at the receiving line at the White House he recognized me and said, Youre the man who wanted an F-4. I said I was and he said, Youve got it!. A-1E (S/N 52-132649) was flown by Maj. Bernard Fisher on March 10, 1966, when he rescued a fellow pilot shot down over South Vietnam. During the tour at NKP Thailand, I had opportunity to go TDY to Ubon Air base. Joe could have saved lives and saved 6 years of his own if had just stayed home. To increase air support for the SEALORDS Operation in South Vietnam's Mekong Delta, the Navy "borrowed" twenty North American Aviation OV-10A Broncos from the United States Marine Corps. At the most fundamental level, we failed to evaluate the reasons why Germany, Korea, Vietnam and others were divided at the end of WWII. Although I was only a few thousand feet away, I hadnt been able to hear the explosion. I will be reading your story to my young ones tonight. Thank you, David. I wish you and yours peace and happiness all the days of your life. During this relatively minor ordeal, I asked permission of my guard, using sign language, for permission to relieve my bladder. 1:00 Jan. 6 will mark 50 years since former Newburgh resident Dave Middleton was shot down in Vietnam while piloting a Loach helicopter on a mission to which he wasn't originally assigned.. Asia. The NVA never admitted to capturing them! The direct hit had felt like wed had a collision with a fully-loaded cement truck. I wondered what good it did to tell us there were guns, MiGs and SAMs everywhere. Using first-hand accounts from diary entries, letters, and family stories, Snyder revives experiences that are accessible and relevant both to historians and readers with a casual interest in . I slipped off the right wing of the tanker into a spot 50 feet aft of where Id have to be for the boomer to plug into my receptacle. Surprisingly, a young couple bandaged my head wounds. But that's exactly what happened to Bill Arcuri when he was forced to bail out of his damaged plane over Vietnam. Everybody has heard by now that John McCain was shot down over North Vietnam, captured, and held as a Prisoner of War; it apparently, to some, is his main qualification to be President. U-8 losses need added My gratitude to you and to all servicemen and women willing to suffer and risk their life for the freedom and safety of our country. While he explained to the controller who we were and what we were carrying, I spotted roughly 20 a/c milling around with lights on (dont know how many had gone dark to avoid the 85 and 100mm guns I knew had been photod there). Good or bad we all contributed and finally got the job done.May all our brothers and sisters that made the ultimate sacrifice, rest in peace. 532 aircraft were lost in combat and 329 more to operational causes, resulting in the deaths of 401 naval aviators, with 64 airmen reported missing and 179 taken prisoner of war. The former fighter pilot, who was shot down over Vietnam in 1967, went on: It was you who were suffering in the oppressive heat & humidity. You softy, dont deserve the freedom which we veterans fought and died for! Thank you for your service! For the next two hours I ate dust, dirt, rust flakes and rodent droppings as we pounded our way over the worst rutted roads into Hanoi. Our TOT (Time Over Target) was scheduled for 1153. Its guys like you who Ive tried to be like when it became my turn to sit in the left seat. Well b fearn, you have a right to make your comment and your opinion, but I do not believe this is the time or place. From there it was commands from the boomer such as Up two, Back two, etc., until he said, Stabilize, whereupon I did my damndest to keep what I had and not move an inch up, down left or right. Only loss: 51-15565 (432d Tactical Reconnaissance Wing) which crashed in Thailand 28 December 1966, both crewmen survived, Only loss: 63-13102 (5th SOS, 14th SOW) shot down 14 August 1969 near Bien Hoa, killing 1/Lt Roger Brown, Final loss: 600282 (38th ARRS) crashed Cam Ranh Bay 7 August 1969, crew rescued, Last losses: four CH-53s (68-10925, 10926, 10927, 701627, all from, C-1A 146016 (Composite Squadron Five VC-5), operational loss (non-combat) 8 August 1967, 3 passengers and 2 crew rescued, Final loss: C-1A 146054 (Carrier Air Wing 11, USS. They never attack until they do it. My arms were tied behind my back with the elbows laced tightly together. Stay up to date with the latest articles and selections from our archives. And Ill salute only with that nickname fondly given him by my children, our Elder Eagle, who flew Linebacker BUFFS, along with numerous other often difficult taskings, during his 28 years in USAF. God Bless You for your service. I am grateful to him for that, beyond measure. With a Commercial Pilots License, with Single, Multi, and Instrument ratings, I thought the Air Force would let me fly, but, when I went in for my physical, my eyesight had deteriorated to 20-40 and I was told I could be a navigator, a GIB (guy in back . Vietnam War pilot tells his story of being shot down over enemy territory and his time as a POW. The 1850 John Stuart Mill quote and your comment that you posted above is powerful and right on. Then with release of the first group of POWs WO1 James Hestand was released! The four-foot stabilizing chute was severed, my lap belt was opened and the butt snapper straps straightened, booting me out of the seat while simultaneously pulling the ripcord that would deploy my parachute. Then came the shock. And I also thank you for taking the time to write down your harrowing and amazing experience in war. 3 crewmen were KIA. On July 24, 1965, an SA-2 shot down an Air Force F-4C, the first of 110 USAF aircraft lost to SAMs in Southeast Asia. The upper estimate puts it at nearly 260 million! Hap. The villagers made short work of removing everything except my T-Shirt and skivvies. We should have learned from the last two years of the Korean War that China would not be deterred from conventional warfare by enormous pounding of both front-line forces and non-stop interdiction. I took one last look at the horizon. [11], William A. Sayers writing in 2019 asserted that North Vietnam only had three aces in the war including Phm Thanh Ngn, with the other "aces" being creations of North Vietnamese propaganda that included claimed "kills" on days where no U.S. losses occurred, crediting VPAF pilots with kills that had actually been achieved by surface to air missile or antiaircraft artillery units and shootdowns of drones. Following the release of all the POWs we met President Nixon at the State Department in May, 1973. "Kos" and "Daily Kos" are registered trademarks of Kos Media, LLC. Fritz came in with the rest of his nape and sent a SAM across the tree line like a horizontal Roman candle. They did not want to lose their Skin in this deadly game while other Americans bravely went to war. records. P.39, Toperczer, Istvan. Takeoff in a heavily-loaded Phantom requires some explanation. April 26, 1968 : C-130B 60-0298, c/n 3602, of the 773d Tactical Airlift Squadron, shot down dropping load at A Loui, South Vietnam. They all worked too. John Stuart Mill Flew supplies into Vietnam but had less time there than John Kerry; which is not easy. Names. Thank you for your expressions of gratitude, sir. When Maj. "Jump" Myers' plane crashed in flames, there was no chance of rescue - yet Bernie Fisher defied the odds and brought him out alive. I found out what its like to be a zoo animal except nobody threw me any peanuts. I was a classmate with him in 64-C but the other flight. Had three square meals a day. The aircraft banked sharply to the left, then to the right. He is presently a retired airline pilot who originally flew for The Flying Tiger Line in DC-8s and 747s and then MD-11s for FedEx. I am unable to understand why I didnt feel dazed by all of the blows to the head Id received. To those who try to insert politics, I agree that it is in extremely poor taste to try to make this such a venue. At the very least, he had just been knocked out. By this time I was at 1,500 ft. He took off the next several days. 1972: U.S. claimed 51 MiG-21s destroyed; North Vietnam claimed 53 US aircraft shot down by MiG-21s, including two B-52 Stratofortress bombers. Sharing your story forward. At least 68 people were killed Sunday when an aircraft went down near the city of Pokhara in central Nepal, a government official said, the country's deadliest plane crash in more than 30 years. In addition to all of your other talents, you write very well. I know exactly how you feel about combat decisions driven by hubris. This is known as temporal distortion. Iwo Jima. In early April, combat flight operations began from detachments at Binh Thuy and Vung Tau. The flight call sign was Dogwood and we were number 2. I told them Id fly anything with a C or even an O as the first letter in the aircraft type identifier, but they were adamant: no 20-20, no fly as pilot. In 1980 and 81, the McDonnell Douglas Plant in Tulsa, Oklahoma was remanufacturing F-4 fighters for the Air Force. Scotty then said over the radio to the leader, Dogwood 2 has a good inertial. Pilots who have used the AN/ASN-46 nav system (Up to 7 NM per hour error) will know whats going on here. Lt Cmdr Frederick P Crosby had been deployed on the Bon Homme Richard, an Essex-class aircraft carrier stationed off the Vietnam coast His planed crashed in 1965 in front of Pham Van Truong's. You who kept the supplies coming to us were a vital part of the war effort. I was concentrating on Scotty and my eyes were focused only on him. Flights were around four hours. So, with that, you have to question the command and leadership, not the foot soldier. Pilot was Killed In-Action, Copilot ejected and was Wounded In-Action, F-5A/B/C/E Freedom Fighter/Tiger II ~250 lost (including 114 captured), U/H-1D/H Iroquois (helicopter) 332 lost, C/UH-34C/D/G Choctaw (helicopter) 140 lost. bombs and eight Air-to-Air Missiles while I inspected the Phantom. Scottys arms seemed to be at his sides and head slumped forward. The USN was the only service which had been forced to learn power projection as the fundamental war-fighting technique. Was the F 14 used in Vietnam? My squadron commander, the pentagon prince and I had an interesting discussion about flight discipline and the military justice system. Yeh, the F-4s wings dont come off even from a SAM induced Spin. On Sept. 12, 1968, F-100D pilot Capt. back then. He did this all without missing a beat. The tale I heard was that at the time the 480th TFS shot down our 4th & 5th MiG-21s only eight of them had been bagged by anyone else anywhere. Ritchie's #463 with drag chute open Phantom F-4Ds flying over Vietnam General Characteristics Crew: 2 Length: 63 ft 0 in (19.2 m) Wingspan: 38 ft 4.5 in (11.7 m) Height: 16 ft 6 in (5.0 m) Wing area: 530.0 ft (49.2 m) Airfoil: NACA 0006.4-64 root, NACA 0003-64 tip Empty weight: 30,328 lb (13,757 kg) Loaded weight: 41,500 lb (18,825 kg) Dulles International Needs a name change. His unit was flying in support of South Vietnamese troops fighting in Laos. My head, no longer protected by my helmet, was now receiving direct hits from clubs, rocks, rifle butts and God-knows-what. He didnt shoot at anyone. 64 to 69. Despite these difficulties, we began to taxi. He told me to find him. I lost all feeling in my arms very rapidly. He didnt. His first pass was- G D- Chief, 200 long. I was way back in trail, tree top, plenty of time to do 2 football fields short. Joe many of the IPs in the 4435th remember you from your smooth ride getting back in the Phantom. God bless you, Sir. No need to bring up the sorties flown with 1/2 ordnance loads so the (Squadron, Group, Wing) would look good on paper. Besides your contributions in F-4s, your time supporting other unfortunates in Hanoi does you honor. According to the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association, a total of 11,846 helicopters were shot down or crashed during the war, resulting in nearly 5,000 American pilots and crew killed. I did enjoy reading this and I am grateful for men like you. It was the darkest moment of an amazing three weeks in Vietnam and I was quite happy to leave that place. The SA-2 brought down many American pilots over North Vietnam. I looked back to my right. Instead Ill thank & bless Mr. Crecca for being among those whom A. Solzhenitsyn-himself a survivor of Communist Russias gulags-called our first heros for successfully resisting an overwhelming enemy, alone, then returning with honor. My draft number was 27. On May 10, 1972, the USAF and Navy shot down 11 North Vietnam MiGs in the skies over North Vietnam at a cost of two USAF and two Navy F-4s shot down. I thought to myself, Im dead. I just didnt know what the moment of death would be like. A well? Wonderful story. Hopefully you have not seen this magnificent video I recently came across, and for a man in love with flight like you proved, I hope it will bring back nothing but happy memories https://vimeo.com/199142621 . Wasnt much left for my remaining Six. Scotty took one look at the patch which I admit looked a bit Sam Schwartz to me and replied, If we have to break for a SAM, well bring it back without the wingtip.. Your reaction to my article bears the stamps of liberalist tradition unhampered by progress, reveals a lack of understanding of politics on the world stage and shows complete disrespect for the sacrifices made by all Vietnam combat veterans. Sad to hear that your Dad didnt tell you much about his missions. I served as Navy, lost friends both in country and after returning home with one still carried as MIA Army Helicopter Pilot.
Danielle Smith Restaurant,
Why Is Rao's Sauce So Expensive,
Reality Equality, Equity Liberation,
Salaire Hotesse De L'air Easyjet Suisse,
Wetherspoons Stansted Airport,
Charli D'amelio 7095 Hollywood Blvd #792 Hollywood Ca 90028,
Is Kai Calhoun Lgbtq+,
Homes For Rent Under $900 A Month Near Me,