by Matt Jackson
“Chicken-man One-Four, this is Cobra Six, over” crackled over the FM radio with a New York accent.
“Good morning, Cobra Six, Chicken-man One-Four is inbound. Where do you want us?” Cory asked.
“Chicken-man One-Four, are you familiar with the soccer field in An Loc?”
“Roger.” Cory looked to Sinkey for reassurance. Sinkey was nodding his head. Previously, Cory hadn’t flown into An Loc, but he knew where the town was located.
“Land at the soccer field and I will go with you for your first pickup. Cobra Six out.”
Looking over at Cory, Sinkey commented, “Well, that was short and sweet. No need to tell us what we’re doing or where we’re doing it at. Sounded pissed, too, didn’t he?”
“Probably hasn’t had a decent cup of coffee since he was assigned advisor duty,” O’Donnell chimed in.
An Loc wasn’t much of a town. Located along Highway 13, it was west of Quan Loi and straddled the highway. A couple of two-story buildings made of concrete block and stucco served as commercial stores, with apartments on the second floor. Most structures were single wood frame with metal siding and roofs. A few had concrete block siding. The largest structure was the Catholic Church located in the center of town. As the major employer was the Michelin rubber tree plantation, there was a heavy French influence in the area despite the Indochina war fought against the French in the late 1950s. Electricity was provided by a community generator that was operated only in the early evening. Air conditioning was unheard of, and a few people had electric fans.
There was a one-room schoolhouse next to the church. A small medical office saw to whatever medical needs there were, and it had been supplemented by US medical personnel when they were in the area, which was being scaled back. There were no paved roads and no sewer systems. As in all Vietnamese towns outside of major cities, human waste went into a bucket and was used to fertilize rice paddies or vegetable fields. If a town was adjacent to a river, the waste went into the river. The soccer field was located on the west side of the town. It was not much more than an open field with a goal post at each end. The local priest was the coach and attempted to gather the kids and teach them a thing or two. He was competing with the medics at the clinic teaching the kids baseball. As Sinkey spotted the military jeep parked there, he set up his approach to land next to it.
“Cobra Six, I have you in sight and will land next to you. Over,” Cory said as he scanned the town.
“Chicken-man One-Four, that would be good. Don’t shut down as we’re going right out.”
“Roger,” Cory acknowledged, looking at Sinkey, who nodded, continuing to concentrate on his approach and landing. They touched down about fifty feet from the jeep. As they did, the US advisor started moving towards the aircraft with M16 rifle in one hand and map in the other. Climbing into the aircraft, he picked up the headset O’Donnell passed to him.
“Good morning, can you hear me?” he asked. Everyone that puts on a headset, that’s the first thing they ask, Cory was thinking. Thankfully some things never change.
Sinkey turned around to face the captain and nodded his head as he switched to intercom. “Yeah, I got you, sir.”
“Good. Here’s what we got.” He placed his map on the center console between the pilots and leaned forward, pointing. Cory pulled up his own map and likewise followed the captain’s directions on it. “There’s a long-range recon element with one US advisor and four ARVNs that I need to get extracted now. They’re located here, on the side of this clearing.”
Sinkey looked up at Cory. His eyes were the size of saucers. “Sir, that’s ten klicks inside Cambodia. Have we got authorization to fly that far into there?” He looked back at the captain.
“Yeah, we cleared this with Division through the ARVN headquarters. The team’s call sign is Panther Two-Three. I talked to them about ten minutes ago and the area is quiet. They’ll pop red smoke when you call for it,” he said.
“Wait, you discussed what color smoke to pop over the radio?” Sinkey asked.
“Yeah, I wanted to be sure they understood to be ready.”
“Sir, we’re not landing to any red smoke. If you discussed that over the radio with them, chances are Charlie heard that conversation and will be popping red smoke. Let me work it out with your team,” Sinkey said respectfully, but with a tone of disgust in his voice. “Do we have any gun cover on this trip?” he asked, looking at the advisor.
“No, I didn’t see the need for gun cover,” the advisor responded. Sinkey just looked at Cory and rolled his eyes. Idiot flashed between them.
“Okay, sit back and let’s get going. Crew, we’re going low-level and guns up. Be on your toes,” Sinkey added.
“Nothing is boring with you, Mr. Sinkey,” Hector, the normally quiet door gunner, said.
“Glad to see you’re awake this morning, Hector. Sorry to interrupt your beauty rest. You can go back to sleep when we get back,” Sinkey needled him.
“Is that a promise, sir?” Hector retorted.
Sinkey looked at Cory. “You want to take us in or navigate?”
“I’ll take us in. You can bring us out,” Cory responded.
“You have the controls,” Sinkey indicated.
“I have the aircraft.” With that, Cory pulled up on the collective, bringing the aircraft up while applying slight forward pressure on the cyclic to move the aircraft forward, increasing airspeed and altitude.
“Take a heading of three-five-zero degrees,” Sinkey directed. “Climb to twenty-five hundred until we get close to the border, and then we’ll drop to treetop and go in contour. Fast and low so maybe Charlie won’t be able to get a bead on us.”
“Roger,” responded Cory as he increased speed and altitude.
In less than two minutes, they were at altitude and approaching the town of Loc Ninh, the last Vietnamese hamlet before the Cambodian border. An Loc was a metropolis compared to Loc Ninh. Not much more than twenty structures, with a store and a Vietnamese compound with about eighty ARVNs and ten US Special Forces advisors. As they approached the town, Sinkey gave a course correction.
“Bring us around to three-zero-zero degrees and put us on the deck,” he instructed Cory.
“I was wondering where you were headed,” the advisor captain said.
“No need to let any spotters on the ground know which way we’re going. Charlie probably heard you tell the team to pop red smoke. Someone was probably watching you get on the aircraft. Right now someone’s probably calling someone to tell them to be on the lookout for an aircraft flying north over Loc Ninh. Everyone across the border north of Loc Ninh will be itching to shoot at a helicopter. Hopefully once we hit the deck and make the turn northwest, no one in the area will be looking for a helicopter to shoot at,” Sinkey stated. He was tempted to add, If you hadn’t told them we were coming and which smoke to pop, ya dumbass…, but he didn’t.
As Cory passed over Loc Ninh and reached the deck, he turned to the new heading at and below treetop levels. Sinkey tuned in the radio frequency for the team on FM radio 2 and waited until he was across the border. He had been over the border into Cambodia several times since June, when all US forces had been pulled out. Congress was in the process of passing a binding resolution that no US ground forces would be allowed in Cambodia. However, the loophole was US advisors and aircraft could still operate there as the resolution had not yet passed. Sinkey knew that most of the pilots had crossed over recently in support of the ARVNs, but this was Cory’s first time since he had come out of Cambodia in June.
“Hector, O’Donnell, look sharp. We’re about to cross,” Sinkey warned them. He was closely following the flight path on his map, comparing streams, the few hills and occasional trail that they crossed as well as monitoring airspeed, flight time, distance and compass heading. Navigation by dead reckoning, as it was referred to by aviators—“I dead reckon this is the right way to go.”
“Panther Two-Three, Chicken-man One-Four inbound to your location. Po
p smoke.”
“Shicken-man One-Four, smoke route,” was the response with a Vietnamese accent. Everyone looked ahead, scanning for the smoke.
Hector spoke first. “Sir, I have red smoke at two o’clock. It’s on the edge of a small clearing.”
“Got it,” said Cory, and he made a slight adjustment in his heading.
“Hey, sir, I got red smoke at eight o’clock,” O’Donnell piped up.
Cory shook his head. “Dammit, I knew it. Charlie was listening and we’re screwed. This is what happens when you tell the ground guys which color to pop, Captain.” The captain did not respond.
“Panther Two-Three, pop smoke again and let me identify. Over,” Sinkey told them.
After a minute, which was probably caused by confusion on the ground over the request for another smoke, Panther Two-Three came back. “Roger, smoke out,” was the response with a Southern drawl.
In the meantime, Cory was flying at treetop level at ninety knots and making a wide orbit around both sites that had put out red smoke, but far enough away not to be engaged.
“Sir, I have a green smoke at five o’clock,” O’Donnell said as it drifted up from the first location.
“Panther Two-Three, I have green smoke.”
“Chicken-man One-Four, that’s affirmative. LZ secure as best I can tell.”
“That’s reassuring,” Cory said to Sinkey as he banked the aircraft in a hard deceleration towards the LZ and the smoke. As he slowed his approach over the trees, it became obvious that the LZ was covered in water that was a couple of feet deep and tall grass. Loading was going to be slow as Cory couldn’t set the aircraft down in the water for fear of landing on a stump or bending the skids on a log. Holding the aircraft at a hover, he must wait for the advisor and four ARVN soldiers to make their way through the water to the aircraft. Hector and O’Donnell were on the guns, scanning the tree line. This is not the optimal situation to be in right now, Sinkey thought. As each man tossed his rucksack on board and climbed onto the skids, Cory had to hold the aircraft steady, compensating for the additional weight and movement.
Finally Hector came on the intercom. “Last one is on the skids and getting in.”
“I have the controls,” said Sinkey as he laid his hands on the cyclic and collective with his feet on the pedals.
“You have the aircraft,” Cory responded, looking over to make sure Sinkey had everything. Immediately, the aircraft was gaining altitude to clear the trees and increasing airspeed. As they cleared the last tree and were at forty knots of airspeed, O’Donnell opened fire.
“We’re taking fire at eight o’clock.” Just as quickly as he began, he stopped.
“How much?” asked Cory.
“A couple of AKs, I think. Wasn’t much, and I don’t think we took any hits. Hey, Lieutenant Cory, is that the first time you took fire?” Both Cory and Sinkey knew what O’Donnell was driving at and started laughing.
Sinkey answered the question. “O’Donnell, Lieutenant Cory has more hours in-country flying than all three of us combined. This is his second tour after a previous eighteen-month tour that only ended four months ago. He left before you and Hector got here. This is not his first time, and he is not buying the beer tonight.”
“Just thought I would ask, sir. No need to be defensive,” O’Donnell said as he slouched back in his seat.
Returning to An Loc, the ARVNs gathered their stuff and deplaned. The captain advisor tapped Sinkey on the shoulder and told him it was end of mission. “You are released,” he said and jumped out. The NCO advisor who was with the ARVN team held back for a second and tapped Sinkey.
“Hey, sir, thanks for coming for us. I’ve told that captain not to discuss the smoke color on the radio, but some people just do not listen. He just doesn’t think Charlie is that sophisticated to be listening to our radio transmissions. Sorry again.”
“Not to worry. Maybe he learned something from this. You take care and call again if you need anything,” Sinkey said. Watching the NCO walk away, Sinkey switched to intercom. “Okay, guys, we’re free to head home. You want to take it, Cory?”
“Yeah, I have the aircraft,” Cory responded. “Mind if I slap on the hood and get some instrument time? It’s been a while.”
“No, you have the aircraft. Get your hood on and then take the controls.”
Cory reached behind his seat and pulled out a plastic hood from his flight bag. The hood snapped on to the front of the flight helmet. Once in place, it looked like the bill on a baseball cap, with the right side a bit deeper than the left side. This restricted the wearer’s view to inside the aircraft, with no outside visual reference. The pilot would have to fly the aircraft strictly from the instruments in front of him. Those instruments centered around the artificial horizon, which was a ball floating in a clear liquid. The ball was divided with light blue on the top half, replicating the sky, and dark blue on the bottom, representing the ground. Depending on the actual attitude of the aircraft, the ball would show the aircraft in relation to the horizon. If the aircraft was climbing, the top half would be more visible to the pilot, and the opposite if the aircraft was in a nose-low attitude or dive. If the aircraft banked left, both would appear equally, but both would be tipped in a left turn.
In addition to the artificial horizon, there was the vertical climb indicator, which showed if the aircraft was gaining or losing altitude and how fast. There was an altimeter that indicated the aircraft’s altitude above the ground. The radio magnetic compass indicator, RMI, showed the heading of the aircraft and would also give the pilot a clear indication if he was turning, supplementing the artificial horizon and the turn and bank indicator. The turn and bank indicator told the pilot if he was in a turn and how steep of one, supplementing both the RMI and the artificial horizon. All the instruments for flight supplemented and complemented the artificial horizon. But if the artificial horizon was broken, the aircraft could still be flown in weather if the pilot concentrated on the other instruments, something that was frequently practiced in a technique known as partial panel instrument flight.
Just getting back at it, Cory decided that he wanted full panel initially. Once he got the hood fastened, he let Sinkey know he was ready.
“You have the aircraft. The soccer field is clear in front of you. There are no obstructions over thirty feet starting at one hundred yards. Hector, O’Donnell, are we clear?”
“Clear right,” Hector said.
“Good on the left,” O’Donnell responded.
“You’re clear for takeoff, Cory.”
“Roger, on the go,” Cory said, and with that he came up on the collective to thirty pounds of torque and slight forward pressure on the cyclic. His eyes were scanning the instruments, and he was cautious not to fixate on one instrument. Immediately, he noted the vertical speed indicator showing a two-hundred-foot-per-minute rate of climb and the airspeed indicator passing through forty knots. The artificial horizon showed a ten-degree nose-low attitude. The UH-1H hovered at a five-degree nose-high attitude, so at a ten-degree nose-low attitude, Cory was satisfied that his airspeed would build at a comfortable rate, which the airspeed indicator indicated. Adding a bit more collective, he increased his torque to thirty-five pounds and saw a five-hundred-foot-per minute rate of climb and airspeed reaching eighty knots. That was exactly what he wanted. He held his collective and cyclic in their current positions, climbing to twenty-five hundred feet.
“What heading do you want me to take?” he asked Sinkey, who was enjoying the view.
“Take a one-eight-zero heading and hold at twenty-five hundred feet,” Sinkey said, playing the role of air traffic controller.
“Roger, one-eight-zero at twenty-five hundred,” Cory repeated, just as would be done with actual air traffic controllers. With those instructions, Cory commenced a slow standard right climbing turn to bring the aircraft to the desired heading and altitude. As he closed in on the heading, he began to come out of the turn prior to reaching one-eight-zero as he di
dn’t want to pass through the heading in a full turn and then have to come back to get on the heading. As he ended his turn, the radio magnetic indicator was showing one-eight-zero on the nose. Likewise, as he approached his assigned altitude, he began reducing the torque so he was level flight as he reached his assigned altitude. At this point, Cory was feeling pretty confident. Everything was as it should be. All was right with the world from where he was sitting. He was scanning his instruments and everything was matching up nicely. What could go wrong? he was thinking.
Continuing to scan the instruments, he was feeling good. Oops, slight left turn and climb on the artificial horizon. He started to correct, but it was not correcting. What the—? The other instruments weren’t supporting what the artificial horizon was showing. Cory was confused for a minute. Nothing is as it should be.
“Sinkey, you prick. You pulled the artificial horizon circuit breaker, didn’t you?” Cory was now trying to get back on his heading of one-eight-zero and his altitude of twenty-five hundred feet as well as maintain his eighty-knot airspeed without the artificial horizon.
“Yeah, you were having too much fun and needed a challenge. You don’t need the artificial horizon, and most of them don’t work in our aircraft anyway. Get used to it,” Sinkey chuckled.
Now Cory had to work a bit harder, using the RMI supplemented by the turn and bank indicator to show if he was turning and the vertical speed indicator to show if he was climbing or diving. It took a bit more effort and concentration, but it was a skill every pilot needed. Cory was thinking, Just as long as he doesn’t pull the circuit breaker for the RMI. The RMI gave the magnetic heading for the aircraft, as did the magnetic compass, which was mounted on the dashboard as well. However, the RMI was very stable and didn’t require the lead and lag calculations that were required if you used only the magnetic heading indicator. With the RMI, a pilot could make standard turns with a degree of confidence to roll out of the turn on the proper heading. With the magnetic compass, the pilot would have to be very good in instrument flight to accomplish a standard turn and roll out on the heading. That level of proficiency was generally lacking in Army helicopter pilots as they didn’t fly on instruments very often.