Hmm tricky…here you go, a dead ringer
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Thanks a bunch!
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Here are some of my rides during my 1971-72 time in sunny Southeast Asia. My D-7at Long Binh, my fire truck at Plieku and my 5 ton dump truck at Nha Trang and An Son.And the skinny guy on the dozer is me. Wayne
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2/7 Infantry. IIRC, we were next door to you - 3/41 FA.
Mike
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Yep. We were neighbors.
I seved in the USAF security police , in Da Nang, Vietnam. from 71/72, 366 security police. my rides varied , a jeep , M113, v100 cadalic cage .a 3/4 ton weapons carrier ( a big jeep ) Im in the procces of moving so my kits are packed up . ill try to post when I unpack.
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I flew into Da Nang in Nov. 71 to start my tour. Wayne
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I flew into TSN near saigon then to Phang Rang Then to Da Nang . on a c123. 3/71 3/72.
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I flew into Da Nang, then sent to Long Binh, then transfered to Nha Trang. TDY to Plieku during the Easter affair, then to An Son before shipping out at TSN at the end to return stateside to Ft. Mc Clellan, AL. Got to see a lot of country! Wayne
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Haha, nice!
@Stikpusher any chance you were Firestone?
I worked Carson and Compton for my patrol time, with loan outs to other stations on occasion. The 16 on the rooftop ahead of the light bar IDs that radio car as a Carson unit. But no, I was never a “Stoney Boy”.
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prior to going into the Army, I’d never flown in an airplane! Not that I didn’t want to, but just never did. Then I flew from Ft. Campbell to Sill in a Lockheed Electra. Not bad for me as I was wanting to get as far from the Tennessee/Kentucky border as fast as I could! Next flights were commercial, and what a difference. I hit RVN on Dec. 7th 1967, and around the afternoon of the 10th I flew in a C130 to Chu Lai. About a third of the way there I was praying that this contraption would just stay together!! After that it was just a truck or three quarter ton for the normal five miles or so in each direction. Things changed after Tet in 68, and we started running south for about forty miles almost everyday. Being still new I often got that task. Started out using a 3/4 ton, but then I saw my first victim of a mine! After that it was something big and something fast! Our five tons had no governor, and were easily the fastest things on highway one. Headed south; there were no MP’s, so we hit it pretty hard. Then we moved out west, and it was always flying in a slick or a Chinook. We got our trucks to the base camp thanks to me and some other fools, but never ventured more than two miles outside the wire. There were no roads out our way to speak of, and the closest one ended about ten miles east, but you had to have those five tons.
I soon learned that it was just stupid to ride inside anything! And I mean anything on the ground. I have rode on top M113’s many times, and even an M48 once or maybe twice. Armored movement ended about five hundred yards to the west of the wire, and the next check point was Laos. Everybody from our base camp flew when they went west, north, or south. Infantry was similar as well, or you simply walked. I did a lot of that as well. Normally the longest trip you made in a five ton (from the base camp) was to the gravel air strip for ammo, or else you were on Top’s list and had to fill sand bags down by the river. Perhaps a mile or two at the most. Just no place to goto anyway I guess. the guys in the ammo section drove more than everybody else combined.
gary
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I vowed to never fly in another C130 again after the second one was shot up at Phu Bai. It got me home but I was real scared! I found out that they forgot to have me sign the payment papers in Cam Rhan Bay, so I had to fly down there. They had a C130 for me to fly on, and top and I were really into it on the runway! Guy from the control tower (nothing but a green 24’ x 24’ garage!) comes out to see if he needed to call the MP’s. Top said no and we’re back at it again. He comes back and says he has a C47 going thru there. Top say hey that’s a good ride. So I flew in a converted DC-3. I get inside and there were real seats and even carpeting! Fasten the seat belts as they started the engines. Then I noticed a real bad smell! About the same time a bunch of chickens come running down the center between the seats!. That’s when I turned around to see that everything from the door to the very back was gutted, and there were two pigs and a cow back there! Now we’re moving and there ain’t no getting off. Next thing I see if a an all Vietnamese crew! What have I gotten myself into now? It still is the smoothest flight I’ve ever been on. I get on a school bus built by Kawasaki, and we go five or six miles than came to a screaching halt at the side of the road. Everybody bolts out of the bus leaving me there. I step outside only to watch the rocketing somebody six or seven miles away (yawn). Go inside a PX and look around, and a guy says where did you come from? I said that bus, and he says don’t you know we’re being rocketed? I said they are; pointing in that direction. He shrugs his shoulders and leaves. I go back to the bus and take a nap. (rockets were everyday up north). I get my paper work done in about fifteen minutes then they find out i never signed any next of kin paper work so in a half hour I was in the little white shack eating pizza!! They drive me over to the air base, and they put me on a C123. To say it was horrible would be a compliment! I kissed the ground when I stepped out of it. Top was setting in a 3/4 ton just laughing his butt off. That plane flew into a mountain side a couple weeks later with 19 guys on board.
gary
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bet you spent a lot of time in Dog Patch!!! SF had a safe house in DaNang, and I’ve been in it many times
gary
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