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Chapter 09

  by Kathy Hufford

   PIGS, RICE AND BEER

Tay Ninn Special Forces Camp Airfield about 5 miles from NuBauDin Mountain , 45 miles NE of Saigon.

When not flying combat assaults, we were tasked to provide regular “administration” flights. This was mostly resupply of remote sites. These could be dangerous too, since you are usually single ship with no gunship support, nor real intelligence as to where the bad guys were.

Many times we resupplied the troops that stayed in the field overnight. We would fly out water bilvets, ammo, food and mail. They were always glad to see the resupply chopper. Sometimes food became an interesting load. Most of the time it was the standard cases of C-Rations. But we wound up hauling cases of Washington State Apples, or gallon containers of Ice Cream. Yea, Ice Cream, the troops loved it. The crewchiefs did not, because much of the Ice Cream would melt into the floor of his aircraft, and he had a hard time cleaning it out. Especially when mixed with blood.

One night we were on alert, and got called to a small South Vietnamese special forces camp about 10 miles west of Tay Ninn. The camp had been overrun, but the SV forces recovered the site. They needed ammo and such. So, we landed at Tay Ninn and picked up ammo and food and found the camp. It was not hard to find, since it was on fire. We had a US SF NCO on board our aircraft who could talk to the Vietnamese on the ground. We dropped off the cargo, and got airborne real fast, since we had received ground fire. Enemy ground fire at night is even more exciting.  You see muzzle flashed, green tracers, and some times if you are not lucky, a thump, thump on the aircraft, meaning you got hit. We got back to altitude, and the NCO said that the camp had casualties that need to be flown out for medical attention. Medical evacuation is to be done “only” by Medivac aircraft, since they have the medic’s, medicine, equipment, and a big RED cross on board. No problem, I got on the radio, and called for a US MediVac helicopter.  It got airborne in about 10 min. and called me on the radio. I told them about the location and the casualties. He asked if there was a US soldier on the ground in the camp. I said, no. He said he could not land, rules you know. I asked him a couple of more times, he said no, and turned around. The NCO was still asking for help. So, we went in, getting more ground fire this time and picked up what seemed like a dozen wounded, to include Vietnamese dependants that they keep in the camp with them. We took them to Tay Ninn, where the Vietnamese had a hospital, they met us with ambulances. We did this two more times. I was upset about the US Medivac aircraft. My commander was upset with my decision. In the end, we did the right thing. You do things in war for each other, you don’t do it for a flag.