Larry Russell (B/227th AHB)

I did not fly into the valley with B/227th on 19 April.  Believe it 
or not I (being a very junior O-2) was doing TDY around I Corps as a 
payroll officer. Maybe they knew I was a magnet ass. I did however,
fly a single ship recon with an ARVN BG aboard  (STUPID) the week
before! Saw nothing, heard nothing...General had me fly too high to 
see much (except a 1/9th loach). Now that I know what was down there
I wonder how many cross hairs were trained on me??????

I remember the valley was beautiful and well defined. Of course with
the weather the way it was we rarely got to see it that way. The 
bordering mountain ranges were 4-5000 feet in height. They formed 
solid walls, with few passages east or west. Most of our flying was 
north-south, the general direction of the valley. I seem to remember
most of the holes in the north and the LZ's in the south. I'll get 
back to this fact later. Almost dead center was a well traveled but 
cleverly hidden road. With psp bridges over the streams. There were
roadside rests tops with overhead cover. We found NVA versions of 
"Jiffy Lubes". 1/9th found a gasoline pipeline running adjacent to 
the roadway. We captured several GMC trucks and even a caterpillar 
bulldozer. The amount of weapons and ammo was huge.

The article you mentioned said we lost about 21 aircraft. I seem to
remember numbers approaching twice that. Steve Harper can attest to
one of them as it happen right in front of him, and it was an H model
so the report is wrong. I think Tolson was the CG at the time, so he
surely can't contradict his own after action reports can he?
We would depart Evans to the east and climb through holes till we 
got on top. Sometimes 10k feet..brrrrrrr cold in I corps in April.

We would then call Evans GCA and fly vectors to the valley, on top
all the way. I seem to remember about 30-40 minutes flight time. 
In the early stages we looked for holes and then spiraled down to the 
valley floor.  Later on they had installed a portable GCA in the 
valley so we didn't need to hunt for holes.  Oh goody!

I remember flying as fast as our new H models would go, low level 
down the valley. Then we'd stand the aircraft on it's tail trying to
stop. As we'd touch down and rock forward we'd be gone. All the 
grunts had heard about the huge aircraft losses and they were as 
anxious to get off as we were.

That may have saved a bunch of downed aircraft. Most of the LZ's were 
south and the NVA probably had most of the AAA set up down there.
We would enter the valley in the north were little AAA was deployed
( this is my opinion - not necessarily fact) - maybe Steve, Dave or 
Mel can add their thoughts.

Flying low level keeps radar guided AAA in check. The top half of the
mountain range was in the clouds a lot, so maybe they just couldn't 
see us at times.

click........................................CLICK CLICK 
I remember our FM radios clicking when we were being tracked by
radar. Or so we were told. If you stop and think about it, the only 
people that can probably tell you exactly what it sounded like are 
dead. We would be flying in formation...click..EYEBALLS WIDE!  
EARS SUPERTUNED...CLICK CLICK   PUCKER FACTOR +10 DIVE 
DIVE!!  TURN TURN!!  We were told that if we ever heard a three 
clicker, it was confirmation of hits!

Made for crappy formation flying for a while. We were so stressed
out, that we'd shove the cyclic around when ever anyone clicked 
the mike. Spent a night or two in my H model, parked on the A Loui
airstrip. Think I slept with on hand on the battery switch and the 
other on the starter button. Sure didn't like that place.

So Mike..file this one away. Next time I'll tell you about dropping
flares at 10,000 feet at midnight..over the Valley..trying to help 
A-1E's spot a convoy of trucks heading south. Oh yes..single ship.

Bob Witt, A/227th sends:

That's the way it was my friend. I was the sixth ship into Tiger,
the LZ was on the top of  pinnacle. Mike Dubberly was the AC as we 
departed the AAA was so thick we broke back towards Laos, the NVA 
were standing in ranks on the road at the base of Tiger shooting at
us.

One Of Delta company's Charlie models went down behind us and we 
broke back to pick them up, on the first pass we broke off after 
several hits that we thought had shot out our hydraulics, turned 
out that the control vibrations were probably from the onset of 
retreating blade stall, the result of  super tight high rate of 
descent screaming ass approach, once the vibration stopped we went 
back in and picked up the Charlie model crew. we landed just across 
the little valley from where Buzz Whitmire and his crew went MIA 
ten days later.

As we lifted off the Chinook came down over the top of us, as we flew 
over the crash site the crew was bailing out of the ramp, and going 
down from ground fire. We took more hits had wounded on board and 
after hearing the remaining guns report no luck for the Chinook crew
we departed for Evans. Mike got a Silver Star, I got a  DFC, Company
6 raised hell that my SS had been downgraded because I was CP.

Later that week saw the Crane go down from a direct 37mm hit
in the cockpit while sling loading a dozer, everyone was on guard 
screaming at him to get out of the area, he crashed at the base of 
tiger, saw the 130 roll over and go in after making a low level air
drop to LZ Stallion ( A Loui ). Went into the valley 14 days took 
hits 11 times went down once. Once involved a six ship GCA from 
14,000msl 6 degree glide slope, one minute separation, guess the 
gooks figured that if one ship came out of the clouds in one place 
followed by another more would follow. Three was greased, we were
five, green tracers in the clouds are shall we say "artistic".

The FM buzz was usually followed by black puffy clouds. At night 
or IFR what caused the trotts was the sound of a near miss. 
I celebrated my 21st birthday flying over the valley. This was 
after TET and Khe Sanh. It is only by the grace of God that I'm alive 
with three wonderful kids and not rotting on the floor of the valley
like Buzz and his crew.

We pulled out the first week of May 68, the 101 worst went back in 
Aug and May 69 (hamburger hill). May 1968 Uncle Ho's birthday
some little gook dropped a mortar round in the Evans ammo dump
went off for 36 hours destroyed 200 helicopters on the ground, sat
in a 20 man bunker with 60 guys for 18 hours  hell of a first 90
days in vietnam.  (More on the ammo dump explosion at the end)

2/20 ARA

Ed Donovan (C/2-20)

 Great guys A\227th and the rest of the kick ass Cav.
I was in the A Shau a lot during the 68 offensive.  Had some 
interesting times to say the least. But to go to the F.M. signal 
thread...very real, very true. We had the information put out to 
us for whatever it was worth & it proved worth a lot. Single &/or 
double tones almost always proved out to be a pre courser to fire 
from what appeared to be radar controlled sources. Made life a very 
aerobatic experience. If any one knows Gary Haynes, then a FNG Lt,
he will be happy to explain the Ed Donovan p***ed off method of 
eliminating those sources of irritation. (Plus a lesson in retreating 
blade stall).

478 HHC

Ted Jenkins sent:

                         APRIL 19, 1968
Don't recall how many CH54's left Danang that morning. All Cranes
 were over nighted at Danang in revetments (this was before Red 
Beach hadrevetments) and we would have to take them to Red Beach 
at daylight for missions. Some of us lived on the air base, next 
building to the "Jolly Green" pilots and some of our unit stayed at 
Red Beach. Sometimes we would just preflight and solo the ship to 
Red Beach and turn it over to another crew. On the 19th, I flew 418 
to Red Beach and picked up the CO, Major Richard Cardwell. 

As I recall, he hadn't been on too many missions and wanted to see 
what was going on at Cp Evans. We arrived shortly after daylight 
but no missions were on the board for us so we remained at Evans 
on standby for any recovery mission that might come up. The Cav
ships began to leave en mass and we were just sitting around drinking 
coffee not having any idea of what was really going on in the A shau
in the early morning until the radio chatter began to tell the 
situation in the valley. We began to hear reports of fierce fighting
and many downed aircraft. We continued to sit around for two or 
three hours when the word came down that a backhoe and a dozer would
have to be lifted in.

Arty personnel had been put on an LZ (Tiger) but needed engineer 
equipment to prepare the fire base. Two Cranes would go, however, 
there would be no gun ship support. None was available. Didn't bother
us then. We thought the valley was secured. I was flying 67-18418
at the time. Captain Arthur J. Lord and CW3 Charles W. Millard were 
in 64-14205 with Flight Engineer SP6 Michael R. Werdehoff and Crew 
Chief SP4 Philip K. Shafer. 64-14205 lifted the bulldozer, not sure 
of the size or weight, but the Cav had some great little dozers that
weighed about 13,000. For some reason, my memory tells me that this
dozer was one of the 16,000 pounders, possibly a D4. Not positive 
about this though. The sky was very overcast to the west and as we
climbed over the overcast and were vectored west, radar at Evans 
said they "believed" they knew where we should start our letdown 
and when we cleared below just go left down the valley.

We had the coordinates and the LZ was at the end of this range 
on a slender ridge or finger. 205 was leading. We were now hearing
all kinds of radio traffic. Not the good kind. As soon as we dropped
below the overcast, the gunfire started and the cockpit chatter 
from everyone in the valley never ceased. Tracers followed us the 
entire way and never stopped. Some of them were almost 
indescribable, more like red and yellow bowling balls. I don't 
remember either of us saying anything until we saw 205 overshoot 
the LZ  and make a right turn for another approach coming back in 
behind us. Then it was  just, oh shit. It was our good fortune that 
we sighted Tiger further out than 205 did and I'm sure their 
misfortune helped us identify the LZ and set up the approach early. 

One of our crew members said that 205 was coming back but they 
were behind us a ways and then he said, "Sir, she's blown up." The
CH47 that had crashed earlier was still burning lying on the side 
of the hill right under our flight path. We made the LZ, and it 
seemed like an eternity hovering with our tail out over the CH47 
while the load was wenched down and released. At this time most of 
the tracers seemed to be coming from the rear. Major Cardwell then 
grabbed the controls, said "I've got it," and he was welcome to it. 

The Crane held the record for vertical climb but I believe we set a 
new record this day. We climbed straight up through the clouds until
we got on top, contacted Evans, and  then headed home. It was a 
silent trip back to Evans. I can't imagine the bravery of the crew 
of 205 to begin another approach after already flying through a 
gauntlet of anti-aircraft and automatic weapons fire. In one post, 
I think it mentions 205 crashed at the LZ. 205 was actually a few 
hundred feet up in the middle of the valley. Later in the week when
the weather cleared, we couldn't even see evidence of a crash.

My flight records for that day only show 2.8 hrs but that was 
enough for me that day. But to me the strangest part was that our 
ship, 418, did not take a single hit. Why? After 30 years, I still 
don't know and I am still thankful. After the 19th, took a couple 
days off but back in the valley to visit Pepper, A Loui, Goodman, 
Stallion, Cecil, Tiger, Signal Hill, etc., on 22nd through the 28th 
Apr and then into May.

Do not personally remember the crew chiefs on 205 and I really
feel bad that I have forgotten the names of crew chiefs on my ship.
I know I should never have forgotten their names. I have one picture 
of 205 "Old Reliable" with the flt eng but can't make out the name 
on his flight suit. I was told the flight engineer on my aircraft 
quit after that flight.

One humorous side note: The 1st Cav, during that week, as you know 
was in terrible shape for flyable aircraft. One day, there were more 
Cranes available for an early morning mission than the 228 BN had 
Chinooks, but that day was the exception. I really respected the 
Chinooks and their crews during the time I flew out of Evans and I 
know a lot of aircraft took off without some defects being corrected.
A couple of days later someone in the Command asked the Marine Corps
for help and a Major led a flight of three CH53's to Evans. They 
looked sharp, clean flight suits, little scarves around the neck 
(forgot what they were called), all cleaned up, the works. Nothing 
at all like the Cav guys who were lucky to get one shower a week.

(The following was related to us by the 228th Bn Operations) At the 
briefing, they were told where they would be flying in the valley 
and what they would be hauling. All was well until the Major asked
where he could pick up his gun ships and what their freqs were. 
Ah, the bad news. No guns available. The Marine Major said they 
didn't fly without guns and he left the briefing, gathered his crews
and flew off. Someone must have said something that night 
because the next day we watched the three CH53's fly in again. 
This time they worked just like the rest of us and did a good job 
as I remember. They just needed an attitude adjustment.       
Does anyone else remember the Marines helping us for one day?
I still have my little green government memo book with lots of 
LZ's, coords, freqs, beacons, etc., just a lot of stuff, if anyone is
interested.

Ted Jenkins

478th Avn Co 67-68

Official aircraft loss data shows"
The crane 64-14205 on the 19th was lost at YD255095
The Chinook 64-13124 was lost at YD260120
The UH-1D loss on the 19th was 66-16799 at YD261087

228th ASHB

Chris Christensen from A/228 sent:

Very interesting about the Hook there Mike. It was an A model which
I crewed for a bit in 66 after its flight eng was medievaced back to
the states. It was always called the Lead Magnet. It was the one 
that while we were loading a couple of jeeps on the side of the 
runway at Dak To a C130 took off with a lowboy inside and drifted 
off to his right and as he went by one of our blades caught up to 
his right wing and went up through his external tank and into the 
wing and cracked the main spar. One hell of a ride on the ground 
and trying to get out of the Lead Magnet and jp4 all over everything.

Old girl used to come back after every beating she took. Guess not 
this one. She was a tough old fat lady.

Grant Fossom (A/228) sent:

228th Bn S-2 briefed us early in the operation that there was radar
controlled AA and that a tell-tale indication that they were looking
at you to add to the stencils on their gun was a tone (not beep) on
the FM. We were told that they need to get two good "locks" on a 
target for altitude and heading, then the third lock was
"katie bar the door". We changed heading at least 90 degrees when 
we heard the first tone, then would often hear a tone again in a few
minutes and repeat the procedure.

This was while flying at 6-10,000 trying to find a hole to dive 
through into the valley. On one sortie with an external load (flight
of two beautiful Chinooks) at 10K, with a VNE of 50K because of the
max external load, I was weaving all over the place trying to find 
the valley through the clouds when I spotted a large break in the 
clouds which allowed me to use my superior map reading skills and 
determine that we were way over the border in Laos. We turned around
and were heading back when my CE (looking through the cargo hatch)
said that there were black puffs of smoke below us that looked like
air bursts. They were probably at least a 1000 feet below us but we 
had no desire to check their ability to adjust manually. Since 
evasionary moves are somewhat futile at 50K in a bird that really 
only "waddled" with a load at that altitude, a load of PSP and two 
water blivets were air mailed to our antagonists below.  Did not hear
any sound before the air bursts.

On a note about aircraft losses in the A Shau.  I know that at least
5 Chinooks were destroyed. The two mentioned in earlier posts both 
went down in flames on the first day. The A/228 Hook went in inverted
about a mile from the LZ (can't remember which one). AC was CW2 
Don Winskey, a second-tour pilot with only about two months in
country. The pilow was also a returnee CW2 who was on his first 
or second operational mission.

We were told that no effort would be made to rescue the crew since
no one could have survived. The two pilots did survive, however, 
and after spending the night E & E'ing, made it to the LZ by 
following the sound of the chainsaws of troops clearing fields of 
fire. I visited them in the evac center at Phu Bai. They were both 
burned, but not life threatening and didn't look bad enough to be 
really scarred. Neither returned to the unit, however. A/228 had 
another Hook destroyed on LZ Tiger. Apparently a RPG blew off one 
of the engines and the aircraft settled on the load it was dropping 
off and was destroyed by fire.  No loss of life--pilot was WO 
Doug Martin, can't remember who AC was. Two other CH-47 losses I 
know of were from B and C/228 (don't remember which). One aircraft 
was hit by an RPG in  the controls closet while off loading at an LZ
about mid-valley.

The aircraft would have beat itself to death if not for the swift 
action of one crewmember who pulled the main fuel shut-off levers 
in the cargo area. I saw this bird as we evaluated whether we would
be able to sling it out. Another loss was called a combat loss, 
but was, I believe, due to pilot error. When diving through the 
clouds, the windshield would fog up inside due to the rapid change 
in temperature and humidity, making it nearly impossible to see out.
The side windows on a Hook don't allow enough room to get a head out
far enough to see much in front of the aircraft. I think the pilots 
did not plan for this contingency and overshot the LZ, going into 
the trees. No injuries.

Pat Murphy (C/228) sent:

Just a note to let you know that if you look on page 24 of the 
September 1968  Air Cavalry Magazine, you will see my ship, Crimson 
Tide 472, with it's butt sitting on the edge of the LZ being unloaded
as the front end is hovered. If I had known that this photo was being
taken, I would have come out of the bird and posed for this guy.  
A color photo of my ship being loaded somewhere in the Nam is also 
on the inside of the front cover. I have zealously guarded this copy
of the Air Cavalry Magazine for 28+ years now, because it contained
pictures of me and my bird in action in the Nam. The photo on page 
24 also appeared in the 1st Cav's newspaper, the Calvary, on 
January 1, 1969.
     
The casualties you talk about were passed on to me from friends 
returning from missions on that violent April 19th, 1968. My ship 
was to lead our company's flights that day with the CO on board as 
pilot, but I remained on the ground due to some type of red X due 
to battle damage received on April 3rd near Khe Sahn. I did not the
exact numbers, but I knew it was bad.
     
I lost my first ship, Crimson Tide 109, on April 23, 1968, to causes 
unknown, in the A Shau after a full day of missions. We went down 
about 6PM. The Hook in the pictures was the new replacement I crewed
from early May until I went home in January, 1969.