Air America _One man's story.mpg

I really wasn't looking for a job with their America I was just looking for something different to do that would be interesting and a little bit more adventurous than what I was doing working in the financial district New York and so I've been scanning the New York Times Help Wanted and it came across a want ad looking for people with recent airdrop experience my airdrop experience wasn't what you'd call recent but I was in the 82nd airborne three years of paratroopers and I had been to airdrop school heavy delivery and so I went to the employment agency and tried to apply they wouldn't accept me because my experience wasn't recent enough and they made the mistake of saying and don't worry don't look around New York for the people that are looking to hire people with airdrop experience because they're not based here they're based in Washington DC so I left I walked went down to the Public Library in New York City on 42nd 5th and got the yellow pages and copied down all the plane airlines that I thought might be non scheduled or overseas and when I went left the library I went across the street picked up to New York rolled Telegraph and Sun and there on the front page was a article about a c-123 that crashed in the plain of jars and I looked at that knife I said to myself because it did say Southeast Asia on the in the inverter sment I said I'll bet that's that's the company and they was there America which happened to be on my list also so next day I called down and and told him that I gone see this fellow he said my hair drop spirit experience wasn't done reasoned enough and I said well I said there's a few other things that you should probably take into consideration and that is I do have a college degree I did go to a delivery heavy drop school when I was in the paratroopers I'm also an intermediate speed radio operator when I had received training for that in the army and I'm a skydiver so I'm used to parachutes and that type of thing and they said well we got a man coming up to New York here in a couple of days and and he'll give me a call when he gets in town and he did I mean we bited me out for lunch and we sat down and chatted over lunch and he said he's still interested in a job I said yes he says ok if you want you can have it you know but he said you still have to pay the employment agency or their commission because it's part of the contract and and you did talk to him first don't that was it that was in December and 1st of January or 2nd January I was on my way to what year was that huh what year was that I'm Brian 1960 uh 6463 ok got a 62 that I that I am a 62 and then I went to 63 January 63 of through the southeast so you left New York and then where'd you go they sent to you someplace they pay or they settle a well just Northwest Airlines to Tokyo through Anchorage and then on the what they call the golden worm the cat convair 880 that flew between Hong Kong and Taipei and also I think flew to the Philippines and then from there on em from there they briefed me got the data signed all the papers because we will just take place that is like they type a okay and a lot of people don't realize it but air america is was a airline but it it didn't own I don't think over half dozen airplanes had a couple of $20 and a couple c-46 a--'s and one or two other things scattered around the our actual contract was signed with a outfit called AirAsia which is based on type 2 a.m. as part of the civil air transport complex and the the reason that air America came into existence was that in order to bid on a you say contract usage stands for United States Agency for International Development in order to bid on the United States Agency for International Development contract it had to be an American company and so air America was formed and they wanted these u s-- aid contracts because they were that was the aegis or to cover that they were operating under in Southeast Asia at that time mostly in Laos and and bit in Thailand a little bit in Vietnam didn't various other places so they our paychecks did heck where air market pay checks but the airplanes and the personnel were Air Asia there are a few exceptions we had some 123 that were on bail from the air force and I can't the Caribous we had well no don't we sit those were civilian care rules probably five hundred eighty-five to that they were the only two civilian Caribous in existence that time all the rest of them had gone to the army and so basically that was that was now how did you get assigned to Laos that's just where I'm sorry that's that's where the major Erol delivery was being done because they were feeding the moms in the mountains of Laos and the bugs were a slash-and-burn culture and they moved into an area and they cut all the trees down and then they burn everything and then they would call to bait rice on the hillside I'm when they had exhausted the the soil at that time they moved on and did the same things from someplace else and because they were fighting now they weren't able they they were operating on a basis fighting who or finding the political uh patent law and the also the North Vietnamese but mostly the Pathak Lao they weren't they were doing this for us yes okay yeah and so they had to be fed somehow so that's where the we fed them with rice and with qui which is a name for the water buffalo over there and Nam pas which is a fish oil which is really the only thing with proteins in it that they get and they really thirst for but we've and so we pre be providing food to the the Huang's okay and that's because the mungs were CIA engaged he mungs Ricou they had trained they had recruited them trained they've Vaughn Paul was there was their leader and the monks were honey play put it they didn't really get it they were Highlanders so to speak the lungs according to their tradition they owned all the land that was above 3,000 feet elevation the the and the Lao people they were the people that were below 3,000 feet the monks are Chinese by descent and but they had since they were now fighting and they weren't able to to feed themselves as they traditionally had had to be supplied with rice and and any other foods where did you fly out of and Lao usually been Tien well then okay that was the main operation yet sometimes we would go to other places sometimes the if the the the food happened to be there they might instead of driving a food say up to vientiane they would they would drive it to savannakhet or or epoxy or long for long or one of those other places and other towns and then we fly up there and pick it up in and drop it but most of it was out of Laos it was on pallets the stuff that we had to drop out or savannakhet in these other places they didn't have pallets so we had to manhandle it to the back of the airplane and stack it and throw it out now at that point this became a CIA operation in America they bought here America then no no no no I'm not - I'm not hundred percent sure about that what when America was a proprietary and was part of what was called Pacific Corporation CIA purchased pair America I think CIA set it up yeah and then later they bought it out as it were prior to Airlines no no I don't believe so my understanding is and I could be wrong my understanding is that they were the ones that set it up originally so that they could bid on the u s-- aid contracts in Laos and in Southeast Asia and then have a cover for their drops of military material they were done on this they were done on the same they were done on the with the same airplanes not always out of the same bases now that's what they call hard rice top rice hard Rice's guns ammunition and that type of thing soft rice is what you eat yeah-ha how the planes you were on then you were dropping both materials on different trips yes but in the early days we didn't the hard rice came from out of it out of love the in a lot of secrecy covered it as to where you launched how you got in and out of Laos decoys tail plates changing of tail numbers and on airplanes and various things like that call signs so that it would sound as if the plane had come out of yunchan were actually had come out of somewhere else now did this CIA personnel ever sit down and talk to you guys as crews or they kept away from the operation and kept invisible no they didn't sit down and talk with us as crews they were in prep they were present in various forms they even had a kicker or two that was with CIA a kicker is explaining kicker what is that well formal names air freight specialist kicker he's the guy that loads the airplane ties a little gallon and then either air drops that are offloaded at the destination no master kind of thing yeah right okay only only a little more the relationship between the kickers and the pilots was a lot closer than we say between a loadmaster air force it was a lonely peon at the ham in god and god fit the they listened to you they consulted with you you could ask them something and it was very good working relationship now you were a kicker to start with yeah and then you came back to the states to get your license and then went back again gently well yeah I was over there for over three and a half years that's a kicker yes and I had been interested in aviation before I took my first flying lessons in 1952 but I like wasn't able to complete them it was the old story that when I had the time I didn't have the money and the money I didn't at the time it's flying trying to to become a pilot on your own pay for it yourself rather than get from Millett areas is tough road to hoe and as I became involved with aviation and more and more and enjoyed the company of the pilots I said to myself this is this is what I want to do for a living so I saved up my money and after three and a half years came back to stage two flying lessons got my ratings did a bunch of flight instructing to bill time and and in aviation it's a it's a tough racket because you can't get job without experience and you can't get experience without a job and so you just go from one to the other any place you think you can build time and it gets say it's and you have to take about any job that's offered because you know if you don't take it there's a guy standing right behind you in line that will because it's hard to build flight time I finally got my time up got my Airline Transport pilot's license and and then made contact was well actually going back it's kind of an interesting story I subscribe to u.s. news on business world war Aviation Week and space technology and they used to have inside the back cover of the magazine a profile of somebody in aviation and I opened it up one day and lo and behold there was a pilot who is the aviation manager for Continental Air Services in Saigon with whom I had flown with a kicker as a kicker when we were both with Air America he had been with Air America but he moved over to Continental Air Services in in 1965 I think it was the so I wrote him he said good to hear from you nothing open right now will if something comes I'll give you a holler and he made a sound like be months down the road and I don't think it was a month and a half later I was on my way out to Los Angeles to to interview for a Continental job in Southeast Asia and then you got the job and then you left how'd you get the word you go in Southeast Asia the I was hired to fly in Saigon and I was a co-pilot on dc-3s and sc7 sky vans and a captain on the e55 Beechcraft Baron then we were there I was there for two years and at that continental air services in Vietnam as opposed to Air America is the we were the only commercial operator in in Vietnam that could people could charter and fly we work for ICC and in in-country construction which is I see bees were the ones that were supervising that but they were building very roads and airports and housing and and things in in Vietnam we flew a lot of reporters around anybody who if somebody wanted to charter a flight it had to be done with continental air services was that was that owned by CIA - no that was now how long were you did you go back to Laos since lion llamas from stay in Saigon no no in 72 the operation in Saigon was cut was reduced the air America by that time when air America was came in their big time finally the they weren't there they were there just in a very small capacity I worked Vietnam as a kicker on a dc-3 and but it was just point-to-point stuff I don't think I don't think we made one air drop and carrying various goods and chattels and people around the country the area of Eric I think had two or three airplanes there at that time it was not much going on that was in 63 63 64 before the big push and then Air America when I came back Air America was in there big time and whatever the politics of it was the reason the operation in Saigon was reduced considerably in the only left two or three people in two or three airplanes there and the rest of us went up to Laos where things were still they still needed they had continental had a pretty big operational there Camaro was it C Continental flew cheek-by-jowl with Air America they're kind of Brand X nobody's heard of them out there but they flew very similar missions dealt with a customer Air America where the heavy lift who's the customer at CIA okay you always call why'd you call him the customer that's what the goal it was it was just a term that that sounded better I think that then saying yeah I was talking to the CIA agent today yeah because I was supposed to it was all supposed to be it was all supposed to be secret when I first went over there it was it was was really harsh harsh said we go to places and they wouldn't tell us where we were going when they got there they wouldn't tell us where we were and under threat of death just about we were never tell anybody where we where he had been we as far as every day everybody concerned we just kind of disappeared off the face of the map but the Continental came continental is a descendant of burden Suns burden Suns is a construction company they leave they're up in the northwest part of the state somewhere and they were over there building runways and roads and they had a couple of c-46s and a couple of c-46s and I think a couple of deal 28 door nears ah and Scottish pioneer 2 but the man that ran it when burden sons quit we're done with their construction work here they had these c-46s and a few other odds and ends of airplanes that with nothing to do in the manor was there there aviation manager he he said shoot I can I can fly charters back and forth between Benton and Bangkok I can drop rice out of my seat 46 as I can carry customers or personnel around the country in my door nears and as an American company they were allowed to bid on this you say contracts so they bid against air America on some of these on some of these specific contracts and the underbid him and it got two contracts and then it just grew from there until they had a pretty good-sized operation but and that happened in 60 and then cotton and continental bought burden sons operate until somewhere in 65 I believe it was and then continental bought them out and it became continental air services and that's the genealogy when you scoreboard to keep track of this yeah but now when you're flying over Laos and I assume some places you got shot up on the ground and what would happen if you went down in the jungle and you're 50 60 miles from wherever how do you expect to get out oh that was Air America you have no idea the the performance nobody has any idea of the performance of those air America helicopter pilots first place you were you always you're on when you're on there flying you're on the radio guarding various frequencies if you got hit and started go down you let somebody know right away you told them what your location was and what you were going to try and do put a dental rice paddy and drop it in the trees or whatever likes the flattest Porter which I did most of my flying in you could slow that plane down to 15 knots and still be flying and and then it's hit something at least it wouldn't be too bad or a munoz between a couple of trees or something and and shear the wings off and slowly down at the same time but those they were they were the they were the ones in and they didn't very often they didn't very often fail I can remember some of the some of the certs and rescues and the picking up of personnel it was those look those guys had more guts than you get here hope to believe and they weren't kids either most of them they were World War two he treads Wow and some of them some one were fairly young but I could many times that I forget how many it's public record you could you can Air America Association could tell you but I've lived somewhere around 150 US servicemen were picked up by them and of course our own people when we went dark we didn't often have airplanes that went down with survivors Emmett kay was captured because he landed at a airstrip where he didn't really know where he was and when he got on the ground there much piell's there uh Ernie Bray let's see how did he I can't remember exactly what story was but he was he he ended up being captured that was the only way to get out them because there was too Harlock oh you just have to hope and hundred if they got if they latched on to you first Cousy else feels a bit last one to you first I was many chance getting up yeah path well but the if you could get out a radio call and then when when that would happen then we start getting we get some support from the air force of a navy under Marines they send Skyraiders over or something and and there is one search-and-rescue we had 105's and everything going around trying to get him out but what I get most of our most of our deaths were from crashes that weren't survivable that we did that the pilots just got in a situation that they couldn't get out let me jump over to Lima site 85 you have a tower site was that gone by the time you were there or it was there the first time okay we we went in there quite often on air drops and very a very impressive sight it was quite a feat that the the Vietnamese did in taking that because you would think it was basically impregnable but they managed to scale the he'd you want to explain what Lima site 85 is what it is you know it was a one of the outfits a what where the basically Air Force I think they also had I'm not sure what the mix was there were people there that had been where X Air Force when I say X Air Force they were sheep dipped or something yeah they they had supposedly left the Air Force and were no longer associated with I guess they wanted deniability and they were also I believe a few civilians up there and they were operating a radar site that allowed the the act greatly enhanced the accuracy of the bombing of North Korea no real thorn in the side of the the North Vietnamese they survived quite a while because there is 85 then the little few miles or was 86 and a few miles past that were 87 but they were working there or they were working their way in towards that site before I left in 66 getting closer and closer I remember 187 that went down now when you say they patent law was making a rogue to that medication ah I know they did they were working on on a road but I didn't I wasn't doing anything connected with that I never even saw it and when I would by the time I left when I left that road wasn't out there yet and it was coming they knew where it was and what it was doing but they didn't have any don't have any knowledge I guess they were trying to put the road in to get artillery close enough to hit the site thought it yeah they had to move they had to get moving they had to get moved in where they could get enough people in there but I don't know you know I don't even know about I read about the attack but I'm not sure how much but was artillery or mortars or there's a whole website on that just I don't know okay now when did you leave or how did you decide you had enough and you were going to come back the second time yeah when you were a pilot that was decided for me that was in December of 73 I've been there over three and a half years has a pound yes and in July of 70 June June 30th of 73 there was a big cut back because the hostiles at advance called the area that we're recovering wasn't as large as it was the things were winding down in Vietnam um there was a bunch of things going on that there just wasn't the demand for air air transportation and on June 30th 73 we had a 50% cut back in people and I managed to survive that one and then on the 31st of December of 73 there was another 50% cutback which I didn't survive and in a sense I was ready to come back because I remember on the 31st of December I was flying back down from up country to vientiane and a beautiful day the Sun was setting in the West and I'm sitting in the airplane and the realization fluttered over me that you know I'm not going to have to come here again it was it was a tremendous sense of relief people never gone through it don't realize and you don't realize it when you're doing it the the strain that's you're under you have our regular work schedule was five days on a day off a day on standby and then another five days on and we were in these porter program that I was in we were we were making 30-40 landing today in in a 7 - 9 10 hour period into the strips that you wouldn't believe if people thought if I told people the kind of strips we went into the length of them and that type of thing they just called me a liar so I don't even talk to people about it unless they've have been there and done it themselves and then because they know what it's all about and when you come back you had five days off out of student five days working then he had a day off and a damn standby that first that next day that you went back up country boy your butt was bouncing on the ground way your time he got home because he just that first day was just you were getting back into the swing of things and then you were back and functioning fine but that first day that first day was murder that's a lot of flying yeah and and when you even you would think it was okay you had two days off but you still had to get back into the mindset of the other type of work and what you were going to have to face out there was there a landing strip called lamb king or something like that Jen don't in yeah and that was in Laos you know ever go in there Oh many times okay now it's private strip of the path of life now it's more or less of a although I think it's a museum more than anything else the long channel is the main base for operations in upcountry Laos era that's where the customer was set up and and that's the CIA yeah now you ever go into you gorn Thailand yeah it was a CIA operation was it not it was a big well it was a Thai Air Force Base and a US Air Force Base also okay but the and that was the head it was the base for air market helicopters there American helicopters pretty well straight south of the river they're almost like two separate operations who Dorne was where the helicopters were and a little bit of rivalry between fixed-wing and rotary-wing they had a they had a company school there they had a beautiful Club pool the rest of it really not bad living at all whereas in vientiane you lived in what you could find there were nice houses in young but harmless a it was basically for the helicopter operation very little fixed-wing out of there did you have a come where we would fly out of there but I mean very little fixed-wing base there I'm sorry right now did you ever know Ted Shackley who was the no case officer invention no okay he probably came after you then wait a minute Ted Shackley was the case officer for CIA and he was there I thought he was there before 60 yes he was there when the limas 885 got overrun so that be before your time then they'd be after well before I was flying there but it was you can have any sighting in five was over run after I left or while I was working out of ent n I was based in invention for three well basically three years I spent a half here in Vietnam so I was in Laos over three years people back hindsight won't you do it again oh yeah wouldn't trade my experience was there for the world it's uh it was exciting at times but the big thing was the camaraderie the comradeship with the with the other other pilots it was great bunch of people with whom to work there were some duds and there were some guys that you wouldn't invite home because you wouldn't want to let him in your house or but they were all out there they're all doing her job and and taking risks every day and there was also feeling it we were doing something constructive it was good the for the foreign policy of the country we were doing we were doing a job that nobody else really wanted to do we were doing a job actually that the military couldn't do the job and this is not to knock the military but there's a big difference between the civilian operation of the military operation military operation is generally geared to the lowest common denominator close to it that is a military mission is normally planned so that the least competent has some sort of chance of surviving it or you just go ahead regardless in and do it the with with civilian if you don't hack it you're out you're on your they're not going to they're not going to put up with you and we were we were willing to work harder faster than a civilian operation like that we were being paid by the hours that we flew so the more hours that we get into better and we get in and we get that airplane loaded as fast as possible and get out of there and get back when we were done as fast as possible it was and and there was a flexibility in our operations that the military doesn't have here this it's it's necessary in the military I can say I'm not talking about they they have a big organization a lot of people and they got it and they have to take it Syria get everything organized I can remember we were if I ramble tell me to stop there is a Air Force fighter jock had a North Vietnamese MIG cornered and the he radio in back to get permission to shoot the airplane down and a Navy fighter jock off of one of the carriers out there heard this conversation so he had it over zipped in zapped the MiG went back out you get here this Air Force guy saying hey shot my rig okay why do you need permission to do something like that then the I was down at savannahket a long time we were having a cocktail party basically in the evening and the CIA the customer we had one helicopter p amir america had one helicopter based at savannakhet and i don't know how old this pilot was but he was awfully thin on top little bit got probably in his 50s somewhere and he's copilot a flight mechanic with there and what had happened is it was fell out in l19 or a1 or whatever they call them now well one I guess they were weren't there single agent and the he had gotten into a terrible thunderstorm airplane got inverted lost control bailed out and he's sitting in the middle of the jungle want somebody to come and pick him up and it was a hell of a storm was taking place out there and at that time the the US Army had a big base at Nicole a place called Nicole phenom in the north what east corner of Thailand and that's where they based above some dark green giants and the Jolly greens headed out to pick up this guy and got some rain on her windscreen and turned around and went back to the confidant so the customer comes over to this CIA this Air America helicopter pilots explains a situation for him where the van was located he wasn't that far away couldn't mean 15-20 miles away from us and he said sure so we fired up the age 34 that had a 13 v 40s in it radial engine is chug-chug-chug you climb to 65 knots he went level 65 knots you might have to 65 knots slow moving machines 30 minutes later that pilot was back at the cocktail party with us they'd gone out it's pitch dark absolute pitch dark went out there picked him up out of the jungle brought him home that brought it back so that again yes that's just hard to understand how that's possible and there and normally the villi and again I does just some of those jolly greens he did fantastic rescue work but it was it's a just a military operation they were one they were trying to get a Johnny green they go in and pick up some pilot in in Vietnam Vietnam in North Vietnam so in order to do it they had to have high cover they had to have air support low down and to have backup the helicopters and they're trying to get all these things organized and by the time they finally got everybody stacked up ready to go in and get this guy a man it's on high cover the jet says I sorry I'm low on fuel I gotta go get fuel so the other delay the whole operation well this guy goes and gets fuel only finally and he comes back it's tanked up and this type of thing going on where they're trying to go in and rescue someone and and it takes him so darn long to organise it that they're running out of fuel well that didn't happen with their America now has the his dcin agency ever kept in contact with you over the years after you got out just to say hi and thanks from whatever well we have got that nice citation and set in only one you know which recognized the work oh but no no personal contact closest personal contact was when the mare in Honduras Honduras was it yes where that 123 was shot down and crew was killed the kicker got out the back they started looking around for see where everybody was that he used to work in Southeast Asia and I was director of ops for your Bemidji board when it see aviation services and fellow from the FAA in in Minneapolis Colin said I just want to let you know that you're not and ask you you're not planning on going anywhere are you you're still working for so and so and said yes yes okay well they're you're looking in to see where all these people are that used to work down Southeast Asia in a round photo because they were trying to I guess find out what they were doing or trying to stop them from continuing doing it or whatever kind of a geyser maybe going rogue on their own but that's the old SE never know it never any direct contact from the company and none and I don't think many other people ever did either no just a few in the new energy well there were some that they that kept on in various capacities southern air transfer when it was still a proprietorial a had a lot of the ex guys from the floor there and but these these these people over there they weren't dashing young men and their flying machines some of these guys they were well well past their prime when me and I have picture my office I'll show it to you it in there of a model 130 and we were we needed more heavy lift so they checked us out in the 130s or they bailed to 130 to us and with the a models and then later on they brought in some some a models you know Hollywood always tries to portray Air America cruises carrying contraband in and out of Vietnam I mean as makes for a good movie like when they made the movie air America well I never never saw or heard of any incident of any Air America personnel involved in drugs moving of drugs nothing not that it couldn't have happened but now a contraband I heard a little bit of that the lot of gold that you could buy very cheaply in Vientiane at that time 35 37 dollars an ounce and people did get one or two did get caught oh yeah I remember there was one instant that fellow did get caught with with cold no no no nothing I think it would I think it was marijuana I don't know what the heck he was even thinking that's how he came into the Philippines and they caught him he had suitcases and they found this stuff in there and threw him in jail and he managed to talk his way out somehow I think he I think he the United States government intervene because he told them that hey you let me out of here I'm gonna start stealing a beans or whatever happened a little Philippine jails like well not only very nice did you ever see the movie here America you know you think it was very awkward or too much Hollywood no there was very very little accuracy to it it was actually about shooting cheetahs off the roof of the Continental Hotel in vientiane they I know that they did that occasionally until somebody stepped on you know Steve Jobs are there little lizards they run around the room for me these these dead they were that's about the time they took guns away from the air America personnel for a long time they they they were not allowed to carry fire sidearms you know do you think the movie did the air America people injustice yeah it was it was just was loosely based on fact there was I never knew any pilot was checked out in as many airplanes as Mel Gibson was he just hopped from one airplane of the other that just humming that just didn't happen there's the Plain of Jars ladies are is a big open area up in the middle of Laos it's called the plane desires because there's a lot of funeral jars big jar of people in Southeast Asia well not so much in in Vietnam there they're buried in vertical hole at the in Thailand and Laos the body is put in a large jar in the fetal position and that got the there - yep and there were a lot of these on the on the plane desires how many miles across and wide any idea I couldn't tell you know it must must be I mean I can picture it my mind 20 20 miles or so okay it's not a hundred miles then huh it's not a hundred miles no no okay say 20 miles right 30 miles I would guess okay I have to get out a chart to check it look no young so why was that being protected well because that that comes in Kuang is there's a talent at the East End's in Cuong and that was that was west of 85 that was west of 36 that would in other words the Vietnamese and the path of law were slowly from advancing from bonbon inside 85 it's like 36 and and working their way across Laos and they want to stop him what amount if they could and they needed they needed to get some support up there and and we didn't have the capacity America didn't have the capacity do it we didn't have one 30s at that time and they did push them back but one day and we're standing around I'm at home and we get a call from the company everybody grab a bag go to the airport immediately don't change clothes don't put on your phone don't anything just get out to the airport so here we go and we're West Oh silly enclosed shirts and no uniform and some of the shirts hanging out put us on airplanes took us down to boudoir and here they had four or five army Caribous part who it is still in the olive drab color and there's a guy up on the ladder on the back painting off the serial number on the tail of the airplane paying over the US Army sign and just left the last three numbers of the serial number so to give the airplane a tail number and we got down there we get anywhere the crews were divided up pilot copilot kicker we go to we climb in the airplane the an army crew chief comes running up so where are you going that's my airplane well just get out of the way we're about to leave here and he says yeah but you don't have the logbook god I don't need a logbook get away from that props I'm going to about to turret and this these the army types they couldn't believe here we are I mean talk about a ragtag bunch we look like anything other than professional pilots we look like a bunch of bones that have been walking down sukham theater sarah wire something in the middle of Bangkok Manila night and fired up and here went the Army's five kara blues down to who bond and we started moving 105's and jeeps and trailers just as fast as we could fly them up to the planes now the military could not have reacted that quickly and gotten that much stuff up there and ammunition in that in in virtually in a matter of hours we were hauling from the time the decision was made it's just another example that that we were doing a job that that a military couldn't do because of their tables of ordered logistics huh because in logistics you know I'm trying to put everything getting permission for this that and the other thing and getting everybody organized all they had to do with us was say grab your stuff and go and we were there and we were gone did you ever land on a plain of jars oh yeah yeah yeah there was strip there oh yeah and we used to pick up refugees there too picked up a123 how many think people you think and get on 123 pack a minute I assume the jars are a joke we played it with this is on the west end of the plane geez ours and these refugees have been pushed out by the appeal and the path of our North Vietnamese and so we had to get them out of there and it was mayhem we we'd land we'd put down the ramp and the people would flood on and what we did is we took straps retaining straps these kind of cheap kind of kind of Krang canvas stretch nylon straps that you cranked up and every three or four feet across the 123 we ran those straps we did and the seats would just put up against the side and these people just flooded in there and on they're not large people you have to realize that but they were handing more women and kids but we would have over a hundred and fifty people in the back of that 123 and the straps were there so when we took off that they wouldn't roll the back of the airplane people were literally throwing babies into the back of the young children into the back of the airplane and with the idea a friend or a relative or somebody would would take care of them until the next load could get down there because they didn't know whether they make it or back to get back or not it's because the patent law was after yeah they were they were on the edge of the plains and these people were trying to get out of there and I mean it was awful lot of people and like I say that kids were being thrown on the airplane yeah we had to we afraid we're going to kill somebody when we brought up the ramp in the back because he they didn't care they were trying to get out of there and they were brought to where uh devil did we take those people back to the basically - I would long chin yeah he launched an operation headquarters well yeah but that's also that was where the what passed for the the among the male ruling family hierarchy were it was and they had facilities Erin once they got there then they could spread them out somewhere else but they were Wow boy you you

Channel: David Quam

Views: 70,432

Keywords: military, air, america

Id: V0jlBB9t3Ao

Length: 53min 23sec (3203 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 31 2011