by Vicki Cody
In mid-May, I flew three separate solo cross-country trips—a requirement for getting my license. Each trip consisted of three legs, each leg a distance of one hundred miles or more, and I had to land and refuel at each place that Mike had chosen. My trips took me all over Kansas, Nebraska, and Missouri, using all of my navigation skills, and to a variety of airfields and airports. I landed on a barely paved runway at a tiny little airfield in Falls City, Nebraska, where a farmer refueled my plane. I landed at a beautiful corporate jetport in Jefferson City, Missouri, where I planned my next flight in the pilots’ lounge, alongside some hotshot corporate pilots in their crisp uniforms. The thought of flying far away from my safety net was intimidating at first, to say the least, but once I took off and was on my way, it was absolutely exhilarating. I learned a lot about myself in those quiet hours all alone in that cockpit. I learned to trust myself and my skills, and I realized that I had more courage than I ever knew I had. It was unlike anything I had ever done in my life. It was just me up there in the sky; nothing else in the world mattered.
All of my trips went without a hitch. I made every checkpoint, nailed every landing, and never got lost. On the last leg of my last trip, I was flying in from the west, toward Kansas City, on my way back to Sherman Army Airfield. It was every pilot’s dream of a day—totally peaceful, not a cloud in the sky—and I felt a huge sense of accomplishment as I made my way home, navigating through the Kansas City airspace.
As always, Dick and the boys were there to greet me when I landed at the airfield. Dick worried every time I went out on a solo trip. He would literally pace up and down by the hangars or, if he was in class, would call the airfield every half hour. I appreciated his concern but also secretly delighted in knowing that for once, the tables were turned and he was getting a taste of what I had felt like so often when he was up in the air.
Mike and I finished the last of my requirements so I could take my final check ride. I studied every chance I got. While sitting in the sun with my girlfriends, I studied my index cards of emergency procedures and they took turns quizzing me. I was reminded of those times at Fort Rucker when I’d helped Dick learn the same rules.
I barely slept the night before my check ride. I prayed for blue skies and no wind, but I woke up to threatening clouds, a low ceiling, drizzle, and gusty winds. My flight examiner was an Army colonel, and my mouth was so dry that I could barely answer his questions during the two-hour oral exam. But once we went out to fly and I took off, calm came over me. I told myself I had done all of this before and I could do it one more time for the examiner. But after a short while, the weather deteriorated and we were forced to go back to the airfield. Later that afternoon, as the sun began to poke through the clouds and the winds diminished, we took off again. I flew the best I could and finished all the requirements. After about an hour, Col. McBride turned to me and said, “I’ll take the controls now and fly us back to the airfield. Congratulations, Vicki, you’ve passed. You’re a pilot!”
All I could think was, Holy shit, you did it! It was a defining moment in my life, right up there with marrying Dick and giving birth to Clint and Tyler. When I landed, Dick was there. As I walked toward him, I gave him a big thumbs-up. He was grinning from ear to ear when I hugged him. “Wow, Vick, you’re a pilot now, just like me!”
That night, we went out with our friends and while we celebrated my accomplishment, we also celebrated the end of the school year. What a great year it had been, with lots of family time, friends, and good memories. We hated for it to end, but it was time to go back to the real Army and new duty assignments. Dick and Tom both had orders for the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and we were excited that we would all be together again.
PS: This was a year of huge growth and self-discovery for me. I accomplished something few people can do. Learning to fly gave me a whole new appreciation and respect for Dick and his fellow aviators. It also gave Dick a new perspective on my world, being the one at home, waiting and worrying. He had more time with his sons than he had ever had, and they were old enough to appreciate that.
10
A Rendezvous with Destiny
The boys and I spent much of that summer in Vermont while Dick attended a mandatory refresher course at Fort Rucker. It had been a whole year since we had seen our families, and I always felt like Vermont was our port in a storm.
But as wonderful as it was to go home with the boys, there were also challenges, and after a few weeks, the novelty wore off, especially for the boys. We were living out of suitcases and didn’t have our own things. The boys didn’t have their toys or bikes or their friends, and I was hard pressed to keep them amused. We all decided that as the boys got older, it was better for us to plan shorter visits, rather than trying to live with family for weeks at a time. Dick and I had to remind ourselves that Vermont was our childhood home, not Clint and Tyler’s.
After that trip, as we made our way south through Pennsylvania and into Kentucky, familiar feelings of anticipation and apprehension surfaced, and by the time we exited the Pennyrile Parkway and drove south on Route 41A, we couldn’t wait to see the large Army post called Fort Campbell. As we drove past the gates (ten in all), pawnshops, liquor stores, check-cashing joints, bars, strip clubs, convenience stores, military clothing and surplus stores, and tattoo parlors, I remarked to Dick, “I’ve never seen anything like this.” It wasn’t just the size of the post that shocked me; it was the seediness outside the gates. It was a stretch of blacktop with no trees, grass, or vegetation of any kind—just wall-to-wall businesses that catered to soldiers. I don’t know what I had expected, but it wasn’t that.
“We gave up Belgium for this?” I was referring to the original orders Dick had received for an assignment in Belgium. He had gotten the orders changed to the 101st Airborne Division.
Dick began with his usual response: “Trust me, Vick, this is going to be great! We’re in Screaming Eagle country, home of the world-famous 101st Airborne Division, the greatest division in the Army!” Then, turning to Clint and Tyler, he asked, “Boys, who’s the greatest pilot?”
In unison, they said, “You are, Dad!”
He was acting so “hoo-ah.” I didn’t get what the big deal was with the 101st Airborne Division and the Screaming Eagles.
As we drove through the main gate and a military policeman (MP) saluted Dick and yelled, “Air assault, sir!”—the standard greeting among all 101st Airborne soldiers—neither Dick nor I could have predicted what was in store for the four of us. If someone had told us then that off and on over the next eighteen years we would be stationed at Fort Campbell four times—that our boys would spend more of their childhoods there than anywhere else, or that Dick would command a company, a battalion that he would take to combat, a regiment, and finally the division—I would have said they were crazy, because that day in August 1984, when we first drove through the main gate of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, all I could think was, Get me the hell out of here!
The third largest post in the Army, Fort Campbell sits on the Kentucky–Tennessee border and has two area codes and two zip codes. It’s its own city within the post, with a daytime population of approximately thirty-five thousand people, which includes about twenty-five thousand soldiers, four thousand dependents, and close to four thousand civilians who help run the post. With its own hospital and some of the best schools in the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA), Fort Campbell is a very desirable post to live on.
For the next three years, Dick and I and our two young sons would experience Army life, the sights and sounds of a large Army post, in all its glory. We awoke every morning to the sounds of reveille and soldiers running PT (physical training) throughout the post. Every evening at precisely 1700 hours, all activity, even traffic, stopped while retreat played and the flag was lowered. At 2100 hours every night, we heard taps. And the helicopters flying overhead day and night, rattling the windows and the dishes in my china cabinet, were sounds that became so
much a part of our lives that we didn’t give it a second thought. The boys were old enough to enjoy the benefits of living on an Army post: the great schools and sports programs, and being with other Army “brats” just like them. Equally important, they were surrounded by soldiers, NCOs, and pilots who would impact them. Army life would become their way of life.
Our house was nothing great—again, very basic: a three-bedroom, two-bathroom brick duplex, with a carport in front—but it was definitely a step up from the house at Fort Leavenworth, and we made friends immediately in our neighborhood. The Grecos lived nearby, and Gail and I were together most days. Our days revolved around the kids’ school schedules and sports practices. When we could get babysitters, Tom, Gail, Dick, and I went out for date night and together navigated the fast-paced 101st Airborne Division.
Dick jumped out of bed every morning, slipped into his flight suit, and burst out of the house, headed to Campbell Army Airfield. He was so excited to be back in an aviation unit, specifically an attack helicopter unit. As a new field-grade officer (major and above) and a graduate of the Command and General Staff College, he was expected to be a staff officer, which he didn’t exactly relish. He wanted to fly helicopters, not a desk. He was hoping his new job as the battalion executive officer (XO) in the 229th Attack Helicopter Battalion (AHB) would allow him time to fly and that, just maybe, he would get to command another company. His wish came true when, later that year, he took command of B Company, 229th Attack Helicopter Battalion, nicknamed Blue Max.
The mid-’80s were a time of relative peace in the United States. We were not at war with anyone; there were no peace rallies or protests as in the previous decade, and no big issues impacting Army life. Ronald Reagan was a popular president and was reelected to a second term in 1984. The hit TV show Miami Vice inspired a whole new fashion trend for men: linen pants, jackets with T-shirts, and no socks. I bought Dick a linen blazer and tasseled loafers, and I thought he looked very cool.
If things were relatively quiet and peaceful in the United States during those years, overseas, especially in the Middle East, was a whole other story. In 1983, a suicide bomber blew up the Marine Barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 241 American servicemen, mostly Marines. It was the first time I had heard the terms terrorist and suicide bomber. Some say that act was the beginning of the war on terrorism that would influence and affect US foreign policy for decades.
I started to pay attention to what was going on overseas because, in the summer of 1985, Dick and his company left for a six-week exercise in Egypt. Bright Star was a joint military exercise between the Egyptian army and the US Army’s 18th Airborne Corps, which included the 101st Airborne Division. Tensions from years of war were already running high in the Middle East, and then, ten days before Dick’s company left, a TWA jet was hijacked in Egypt.
I was more nervous than usual when we, the families of Blue Max, gathered at Campbell Army Airfield to say good-bye to Dick and B Company. I didn’t think the charter plane was in danger of a hijacking; I was just worried overall because they were going to a part of the world that was in constant chaos, not to mention the fact that my and the other wives’ husbands would be flying their helicopters in a very tough and unforgiving environment, the Egyptian desert. As unsettled as I felt, I didn’t show it as the boys and I hugged Dick good-bye. We had six weeks looming ahead of us, and I was responsible for all the families in our unit, so I put a smile on my face.
Two weeks into the exercise, Dick called. I knew something was wrong because I had not expected to hear from him.
“One of my Cobras went down in the desert. It’s a Class A, Vicki.”
I was silent. In that split second, I remembered Shaun’s accident in Savannah, when Dick had also used the term Class A, which meant catastrophic damage and/or loss of life. I opened my mouth to speak, when he said, “We lost one of our pilots, and an Egyptian officer is injured.”
“Oh, Dick, I’m so sorry.” At times like that, I just didn’t know what else to say. “Can you tell me who it is?”
“I will give you the name, but under no circumstances can you tell anyone until after the official notification is made. And that is going to be difficult because once this hits the news, everyone will be calling you for information. You’re going to have to be strong, Vick.”
“I know, Dick. How are your guys holding up? Are you okay?”
“They’re in shock right now. We all are. I’ll call you when I can, but with the investigation and the ongoing training exercise, it’s going to be hectic.”
I could hear sadness and fatigue in his voice. He was anything but his usual upbeat, energetic self. It was difficult any time tragedy struck, but even harder when Dick was far from home. It meant he and his guys had to put aside their grief and continue their training, and that I had to handle everything on my own—not just for my family, but for the families of our unit.
My phone rang all afternoon, and it was agonizing not to be able to tell the other spouses what I knew. It wasn’t until that evening that the Brigade XO called to tell me the notification had been made and I could begin the process of telling the spouses in our unit. The wife of our fallen pilot had gone home to her family for the deployment, which made it difficult to reach out to her. Since I couldn’t control any of that, I focused on the people in our company who were counting on me for support, and my own two boys. I spent the next few days on the phone, reassuring, calming, consoling, and attempting to quiet the rumor mill. I was in a tough position and had to reiterate to everyone that, as awful as it was, our guys had to finish out their mission in Egypt. Although I missed Dick more than ever, in the end I got my strength and support from the other spouses and was amazed at how resilient we all were.
By the time Dick and his guys returned home, it had been four weeks since the accident. I was so relieved when they landed safely at Campbell Army Airfield that I cried when Dick got off the plane. Their return reopened the wound from the accident, and we went through a short period of grief all over again, as a couple and as a unit.
“Do you realize how much I worry about you, especially when you are so far away? And every time we go through an accident, I think it could have been you,” I told Dick.
“I know, Vick. What can I say? I can’t tell you these things aren’t going to happen. All I can do is to be safe and try to keep my guys safe. Sometimes I can’t, and that kills me.”
Just a few months later, a plane crash on December 12, 1985, shook our entire Army post and the surrounding communities. A plane carrying 248 soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division, returning from a six-month peacekeeping mission on the Sinai Peninsula, crashed after refueling in Gander, Newfoundland. All the soldiers and crew were killed—fellow soldiers, people we knew, friends and neighbors.
Our post transitioned from the excitement of welcome-home ceremonies and the approaching holidays to a horrific scene of news media, images of burning wreckage on TV, and grieving families. The Gander crash was the biggest air disaster in the history of the military and the largest loss of life in a single event in the Army.
Dick and his unit were in Georgia on a training exercise when it happened, and by the time he called, I thought I was all cried out. “Dick, you wouldn’t believe what it’s like here. This is unlike anything we’ve ever experienced,” I said.
Then Dick told me the name of a friend who had been on the downed plane, and I felt like it was all too much to take. Grief from all the accidents he and I had been through in recent years came crashing down on me that day. I hated to cry to Dick when he was gone, because I didn’t want him worrying about me, but this time I couldn’t stop myself.
I called Gail and my good friend Connie, and they were as stunned as I was. Connie’s husband, Terry, was in the 502nd Infantry Brigade, the unit that had lost the most soldiers. She told me that he was preparing to go to Gander to help identify their bodies.
I tried to prepare myself for Clint and Tyler’s return from school, as I had n
o way of knowing what, if anything, they knew. When they came in, Clint began talking immediately. “Mom, lots of people were crying, and John’s dad was supposed to come home today, but then someone said the plane crashed.”
Tyler, just six years old, chimed in, “Yeah, and there were kids in my class that had to go home and they were crying, too.”
I chose my words carefully and tried to be calm as I explained, “Okay, there was a plane crash. It was a big plane that had soldiers on it that were coming back from the Sinai. The soldiers died, and it’s very sad for their families and for all of us at Fort Campbell.”
I was walking a fine line. I knew Clint was thinking that the same thing could happen to his dad. I thought, How in the world can I explain this to them without scaring them too much? I couldn’t just tell an eight-year-old and a six-year-old that there are no guarantees in life. Clint was old enough to understand a little bit about what his dad did for a living, but I had to be careful and not make promises.
“Sometimes bad things happen and we don’t know why.”
“What if something bad happens to Dad? When is he coming home?”
“I don’t think anything bad is going to happen to your dad. He’s very strong, and he’s the best pilot I know. He called today, and he’ll be home next week.”
That seemed to put the subject to rest for the time being. I knew in the coming days I would have more discussions with the boys as we learned additional details. Like a tornado that cuts a swath through a community, so, too, did the Gander crash. It was indiscriminate in the lives it claimed. It was unexpected, and it was scary, and as we listened to speculation about a possible terrorist attack or foul play of some sort, we were all unsettled.