** Door gunner's view, one on each side of helicopter **For so many years, I’ve tried to put my Vietnam experience behind me. Until recently when, through the wonderful Internet (thanks Al Gore ) I’ve come to realize there are others I served with who went through similar emotions and struggles as we all tried to fit back in to our individual worlds and forget Vietnam. We all grew up fast, the average age 19 years old; I had my 20th birthday there. I saw things and lived a life I otherwise would not have experienced anywhere else. (I’m reminded of Three Dog Night’s song, Momma Told Me Not Come.) I couldn’t watch any Vietnam war movies until the 1980's sometime. I don’t want to dramatize my experience to make it worse than it was; as I know it could have been worse. I’ve seen enough photo documentation of the grunts (infantry) to know my experience wasn’t as bad as some. Before enlisting I’d been smart enough to know I didn’t want to be a "ground-pounder" if I went to Vietnam, so I volunteered for helicopters. I never thought I’d be flying as much and be in peril, albeit, not in the gun-battle sense of it. My days were filled with semi-boredom, hours of flight, intermittent with fuel and reloading stops, worry, adrenaline rushes, hot and oily helicopter maintenance work and feeling like John Wayne.
I’ll never forget sitting at the door gunners’ position in our Chinook helicopter on a remote mountain top firebase somewhere in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, the noisy engine and rotor blades going, as our internal cargo was unloaded by a human work chain of dirty, young GI's. I sat at a window mounted M-60 machine gun, locked and loaded ready to fire. I was scanning the tree line, ever vigilant as I knew we were a big target. I was new at this flying thing and one of my jobs as gunner was to also watch the rotor blades to ensure the pilots are aware of any obstacles, lest we hit something and ruin our day. (I knew that the blades would go out of sync and the instantaneous destruction of the aircraft would be horrendous. I stood a good chance of being cut into pieces, decapitated or otherwise terribly mangled with little chance of survival. I know, this happened to the door gunners on Chinooks in the past with a similar results, it still does today, and will continue to do so. It’s the design of the helicopter. The FAA had never approved the Chinook CH-47 model for civilian use because of the propensity for disaster. We were all more worried about mechanical failure than enemy fire. The one used in major cities are the CH-46, a different version, and used by the Marines and Navy.)
Enough of the mechanical issue, back to my original thought. As I sat there, the rotor blades kicking up dust, the noise of the two jet engines and high pitched squeal of the two transmissions, a young grunt attached to this artillery company sitting in his bunker about 100 feet away caught my attention. I waved at him. Trying to block the dust from his face, he waved back and in well-known sign language, he put his finger to the side of his head, and rotated it in circles; the crazy sign. And then he pointed at me, gesturing to me that I was crazy for flying in this helicopter. I smiled and in typical young, defiant, male attitude, I pointed back at him with the same motions, indicating he was the crazy one for being out here in the middle of no where on this mountain top.
At the end of the day, I went back to Camp Holloway, Pleiku, where I had a army bunk, with sheets if I wanted to sleep in them, rows of buildings, a make-shift fort, kinda like those the Army set up in the middle of Indian Country in the old west. (The Army is so ‘anal.’) With us in the enemy’s country, we were subject to occasional mortar or rocket attacks at night; sitting ducks all lit up for them. We had the occasional black-out order, with "lights out" call to lessen us as a target, but only after the first yell of "incoming" when everyone ran for cover. The first such attacks I fled to the nearby bunker for safety. It was not always clean and it was always dark inside, with it’s metal and dirt roof and sandbag walls. Somewhere during my year, I was either too tired, too drunk, too accustomed to it all or too tired of the filth in the bunkers and I merely crawled under the nearest metal bunk, feeling annoyed yet hopeful my hooch wasn’t hit. I said and heard many prayers in these situations. One such attack happened while I was on guard duty and we all thought we were going to be over-run with the typical, human wave of the enemy - it didn't happen. I was jumpy at sudden loud noises for a long time.
I’ll never forget sitting at the door gunners’ position in our Chinook helicopter on a remote mountain top firebase somewhere in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, the noisy engine and rotor blades going, as our internal cargo was unloaded by a human work chain of dirty, young GI's. I sat at a window mounted M-60 machine gun, locked and loaded ready to fire. I was scanning the tree line, ever vigilant as I knew we were a big target. I was new at this flying thing and one of my jobs as gunner was to also watch the rotor blades to ensure the pilots are aware of any obstacles, lest we hit something and ruin our day. (I knew that the blades would go out of sync and the instantaneous destruction of the aircraft would be horrendous. I stood a good chance of being cut into pieces, decapitated or otherwise terribly mangled with little chance of survival. I know, this happened to the door gunners on Chinooks in the past with a similar results, it still does today, and will continue to do so. It’s the design of the helicopter. The FAA had never approved the Chinook CH-47 model for civilian use because of the propensity for disaster. We were all more worried about mechanical failure than enemy fire. The one used in major cities are the CH-46, a different version, and used by the Marines and Navy.)
Enough of the mechanical issue, back to my original thought. As I sat there, the rotor blades kicking up dust, the noise of the two jet engines and high pitched squeal of the two transmissions, a young grunt attached to this artillery company sitting in his bunker about 100 feet away caught my attention. I waved at him. Trying to block the dust from his face, he waved back and in well-known sign language, he put his finger to the side of his head, and rotated it in circles; the crazy sign. And then he pointed at me, gesturing to me that I was crazy for flying in this helicopter. I smiled and in typical young, defiant, male attitude, I pointed back at him with the same motions, indicating he was the crazy one for being out here in the middle of no where on this mountain top.
At the end of the day, I went back to Camp Holloway, Pleiku, where I had a army bunk, with sheets if I wanted to sleep in them, rows of buildings, a make-shift fort, kinda like those the Army set up in the middle of Indian Country in the old west. (The Army is so ‘anal.’) With us in the enemy’s country, we were subject to occasional mortar or rocket attacks at night; sitting ducks all lit up for them. We had the occasional black-out order, with "lights out" call to lessen us as a target, but only after the first yell of "incoming" when everyone ran for cover. The first such attacks I fled to the nearby bunker for safety. It was not always clean and it was always dark inside, with it’s metal and dirt roof and sandbag walls. Somewhere during my year, I was either too tired, too drunk, too accustomed to it all or too tired of the filth in the bunkers and I merely crawled under the nearest metal bunk, feeling annoyed yet hopeful my hooch wasn’t hit. I said and heard many prayers in these situations. One such attack happened while I was on guard duty and we all thought we were going to be over-run with the typical, human wave of the enemy - it didn't happen. I was jumpy at sudden loud noises for a long time.
3 comments:
I remember being in Hawaii with you over Christmas and New Years and whenever a firecracker went off, you would put your hands up to protect your head and duck. Glad you stopped doing that.
And glad I didn't know you when you were hanging out of a moving helicopter
Hey I just wanted to let you know I was here on your blog and to tell you that Kristin will be playing ball in St. George on Saturday if you and Carol are up there you should drop by. They will be playing at Dixie College at 12 and 2.
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