A fairly brief account of the first time I witnessed an LOH being shot down with fatalities. I still remember the sickened, disbelieving feelings I had when it occured. I have tried to keep it just to the significant details and free of embelishment:

       Easter Offensive 1972, Central Highlands

       Its kind of funny for me that with all the hot shit heli-warriors I have met that claim to have so much experience and knowledge regarding the Vietnam war, few know so little of this period. I can't tell you how many have discounted my experience as 'nothing' compared to the 'real' war prior to 1970. And, for the most part, I have bought it. I had nothing to compare my experience to except the 'war stories' I have heard. But some of the guys I was with over there, 2nd and 3rd tour guys, told me at the time that they had never seen anything like it. They seemed pretty grim about it then too.

       I remember Cpt Powell (our Scout Platoon Leader) commenting the night before he was killed that he felt his luck was running out. In two previous tours he had been shot down a total of three times. During the month of April 72, he has shot down three times in two weeks. The seventh was his last. I was in the front seat of the lead snake on that mission. The date was 19APR72.

       We were told enroute what our mission was to be. While heading south/east from Holloway, we were told that we were looking for a Brigade strength NVA unit that had hit two Mountnyard resettlement villages during the night. God, you could feel the tension in the voices on the radio as they asked for more info. Jeff Clink (CW2, AC in the lead Cobra) said over the intercom, "Are you fuckin' shittin' me?" We kind of flew in huge lazy S pattern and then circled back so as to give the impression we were not heading specifically to their location. A low rising round hill was selected as a starting point for the recon. Cpt Powell's voice sounded different from his usual manner. He rarely ever gave any indication of his stress or fear... but this time it was there.

       After he gave us his appraisal of the terrain and told us his planned path, he dropped down to the deck. He started at the top and started a left hand spiral decent around the hill. He never made one complete orbit around thehill before he shouted "Taking fire, taking fire!" His flight path straightened heading in a south/west track trailing smoke. The LOH appeared to be wobbling. He went less than fifty yards before he crashed. The LOH exploded and burned. We turned into the point where he first took fire and flew straight in, I was on the mini and Clink was firing rockets as fast as he could punch the button. I could see flashes of ground fire all over the hill. What a rush!

       That was the first time I saw a crash and burn with fatalities. After the rockets were expended and a couple of low passes to confirm both men were KIA, we had to leave the area. There was no back up to join us there. We had no blues. No Tac Air. Our mission then became one of recovering our downed men if at all possible. When we returned to Holloway to rearm and refuel, our C&C bird went to the MACV compound to try to get some ARVN troops to insert and secure the crash site.

       Our snakes returned twice to the crash site during this time and fired rockets into areas where I saw the flash of returned fire earlier. Finally, after about two and a half hours, three slicks returned with some ARVNs and five volunteers from our unit. On landing, the ARVN got out but refused to move to the crash site electing to secure the landing site instead. Our men made it to the smoking wreck and pulled the remains out. The bodies were beyond recognition and still so hot they burned the hands of the men trying to pull them out. They finally succeeded but the bodies were just a bundle of pieces of charred flesh wrapped in ponchos. I think those poor guys down there were probably scarred for life with that experience.

       During the time it took to round up the recovery team, the NVA unit had left the area and we never saw any enemy KIA

Steve Shepard
CW2 AUS Ret.
Air Cav Snake Driver
A 7/17, C 7/17, H/10. 71-72
Tehachapi California