[editor] I found another story on Facebook by James, talking about his helicopter and his first mission on it.
July 25, 1967, Dak To, Vietnam
335th Assault Helicopter Co., Cowboys
Falcon Gunship #12930
Early in July 1967, I was working in the maintenance platoon for the Cowboys at Dragon Mountain, which was south of Pleiku, and later became Camp Enari.
One morning at a very casual company formation it was announced that a new crew chief was needed for the gunship platoon. I had already flown missions with my previous company the 128 AHC as a substitute gunner and crew chief so I half-heartedly moved my hand up a little bit figuring other guys who had been there longer than me would get picked first.
To my surprise the sergeant call my name and I looked around and realized no one else had volunteered.
My next surprise was when I found out my ship would be #12930, the oldest, slowest and most worn-out ship in the platoon with matching armament. Seniority protocol allowing the other seven crew chiefs in the platoon to slide up the line to the better ships if they wanted to.
#12930 was in for 100-hour inspection so I helped compete it then packed my duffel bag in the ship and got my first stick time lesson from our maintenance officer flying the ship up to Dak To, where our flight platoons were based. (I was passable at straight and level, nothing more.)
Two days later my ship was part of a light fire team on night- standby. At about 8:00 pm my official duties as a crew chief on my own ship began with what turned out to be one of the most harrowing nights of my life.
We were scrambled to the Special Forces Camp at Doc Seang that was in peril of being overrun. The copy of a page from our company monthly history is quite accurate.
My remembrances of the night were how hard it was to see anything, I had never flown a night mission before, how alone our two ships seemed as we flew under the clouds, through the fog and around the hills to get to Doc Seang.
Once there everything changed as the sky was lit by the eerie light given off by swaying phosphorescent flares, slowing floating down under their parachutes, and sudden darkness when they went out. Explosions on the ground seemed huge. It was the first time I saw tracer fire at night, from above, with reddish orange streaks flashing in all different direction, sometimes ricocheting off at sharp angles. It was a terrifying light show.
As we circled overhead the radio was full of chatter attempting to help us figure out where the enemy was and where to place our rocket and machine gun fire most affectively.
After a few passes my M-60 jammed and in the dark I was unable to clear it so I used my M-16 till I ran out of clips then emptied the co-pilots M-14.
Another fire team arrived just as we expended all of our ordinance and we made the hairy flight back to Dak To too rearm and refuel and flew back to Doc Seang and did it again. The second flight back was more nerve wracking then the first because we knew what we were flying back to.
I never got an accurate description of exactly what happened on the ground, but it seems in this instance we helped save the night.
I feel funny posting the award stuff. At the end of the day, I was just a passenger on a Huey, shooting down at something I couldn’t see and hoping for the best. The pilots had a much harder job flying in those conditions and I cannot tell you how much admiration I had and still have for the men on the ground who were stuck in middle of the fight with nowhere to go and no choice but to win.
James Loesch
February 11, 2018
July 25, 1967, Dak To, Vietnam
335th Assault Helicopter Co., Cowboys
Falcon Gunship #12930
Early in July 1967, I was working in the maintenance platoon for the Cowboys at Dragon Mountain, which was south of Pleiku, and later became Camp Enari.
One morning at a very casual company formation it was announced that a new crew chief was needed for the gunship platoon. I had already flown missions with my previous company the 128 AHC as a substitute gunner and crew chief so I half-heartedly moved my hand up a little bit figuring other guys who had been there longer than me would get picked first.
To my surprise the sergeant call my name and I looked around and realized no one else had volunteered.
My next surprise was when I found out my ship would be #12930, the oldest, slowest and most worn-out ship in the platoon with matching armament. Seniority protocol allowing the other seven crew chiefs in the platoon to slide up the line to the better ships if they wanted to.
#12930 was in for 100-hour inspection so I helped compete it then packed my duffel bag in the ship and got my first stick time lesson from our maintenance officer flying the ship up to Dak To, where our flight platoons were based. (I was passable at straight and level, nothing more.)
Two days later my ship was part of a light fire team on night- standby. At about 8:00 pm my official duties as a crew chief on my own ship began with what turned out to be one of the most harrowing nights of my life.
We were scrambled to the Special Forces Camp at Doc Seang that was in peril of being overrun. The copy of a page from our company monthly history is quite accurate.
My remembrances of the night were how hard it was to see anything, I had never flown a night mission before, how alone our two ships seemed as we flew under the clouds, through the fog and around the hills to get to Doc Seang.
Once there everything changed as the sky was lit by the eerie light given off by swaying phosphorescent flares, slowing floating down under their parachutes, and sudden darkness when they went out. Explosions on the ground seemed huge. It was the first time I saw tracer fire at night, from above, with reddish orange streaks flashing in all different direction, sometimes ricocheting off at sharp angles. It was a terrifying light show.
As we circled overhead the radio was full of chatter attempting to help us figure out where the enemy was and where to place our rocket and machine gun fire most affectively.
After a few passes my M-60 jammed and in the dark I was unable to clear it so I used my M-16 till I ran out of clips then emptied the co-pilots M-14.
Another fire team arrived just as we expended all of our ordinance and we made the hairy flight back to Dak To too rearm and refuel and flew back to Doc Seang and did it again. The second flight back was more nerve wracking then the first because we knew what we were flying back to.
I never got an accurate description of exactly what happened on the ground, but it seems in this instance we helped save the night.
I feel funny posting the award stuff. At the end of the day, I was just a passenger on a Huey, shooting down at something I couldn’t see and hoping for the best. The pilots had a much harder job flying in those conditions and I cannot tell you how much admiration I had and still have for the men on the ground who were stuck in middle of the fight with nowhere to go and no choice but to win.
James Loesch
February 11, 2018
Here are the photos James posted along with the story.