[Vhfcn-l] Comment from today's pilots

[John W. Hart]

 From a personal perspective, I think we were trained differently than 
today's pilots.  I was 24 years old and had been in the Army 6 years.  I 
was a SGT. E-5.  I started WORWAC 65-4W in Oct. 64, graduated June 65.  
Class size at the start of Preflight was 119 souls.  We Graduated 47 in 
class 65-4W at Ft Rucker on 8 June 1965.   I was trained in the Hiller 
OH-23D.  For example, in the early part of our training, we were 
required to solo within 17 hours or we were washed out of the course.  
The next thing after solo was to solo in aotorotations to a touchdown on 
both sod and paved touchdown areas at the stage field.  There were solo 
requirements for hovering autorotations. straight in autorotations, low 
level aoutoraotations (from 50' altitude), and 180 degree 
autoraotations, all to a touchdown at the stage field. Some days, right 
after initial solo, all you did was autorotations to a touchdown.  Our 
forced landings were initiated unannounced by the instructor by rolling 
the throttle to flight idle.  We were expected to select a touchdown 
area and conduct the touchdown unless the instructor announced a power 
recovery prior to touchdown.  If you couldn't handle it, it got you a 
pink slip. Three pink slips in a row for the same maneuver got you an 
evaluation ride with Flight Evaluation, which when I went through 
Wolters, were mostly DA Civilians.  Damn few that went to Flight Eval 
made it back to continue training.  You could get washed out of flight 
school for attitude.  For example, one night in our 3rd month at 
Wolters, while we were cleaning the latrine at about 2030 hours after a 
helluva long day, one of my classmates let out a loud, "I hate this 
f---ing place."  At reveille, he was told to report to the orderly 
room.  After breakfast we returned to the barracks to find him packing 
his bags.  He told us he had been washed out for "attitude" , and he had 
his orders in hand to prove that he had been eliminated from the 
course.  Fort Rucker wasn't any different in the way we were expected to 
conduct ourselves and our flight training.  An example, we were trained 
in the UH-19C and D during the tactics phase of our training.  There 
were about 10 hours devoted to transitioning to the UH-19, then tactics. 
We were required to memorize the UH-19 checklist verbatim for startup, 
taxi, takeoff, and shutdown.  Failure to have it memorized by a certain 
amount of time earned you the dubious honor of carrying a full size 
cockpit photograph with you all day long until you got it memorized, or 
washed out of the course at a certain point.  I know this because I 
carried one for almost a week.  After tactics, we transitioned to the 
UH-1 for 10 hours, mostly UH-1A models.  We transitioned to the UH-1 for 
10 hours, mostly UH-1A models.  If I remember correctly there were about 
5 or 6 UH-1D aircraft at Rucker at the time and only one of them was 
equipped with a 48' rotor system, the remaining had 44' rotor systems.  
Then 10 hours of basic instruments in UH-1A and B models.  A few of the 
UH-1B aircraft had auxiliary fuel tanks in the back with enough fuel to 
actually fly long enough to go somewhere IFR and make it to an 
alternate.  If we were lucky enough to draw one of these aircraft the 
instructor would file IFR and we'd actually fly in the clouds if the 
weather cooperated. The instrument complement in those aircraft were 
what I experienced in UH-1 aircraft throughout my career in Army 
aviation - 1 VOR with glideslope, 1 ADF, 1 single light marker beacon, 
and the usual UH-1 panel with RMI, CDI with Glideslope displays, one 
marker beacon light, and the 2 attitude indicators, a turn and slip 
indicator, mag compass, and the usual engine and transmission gauges.  
We were not issued any kind of instrument ticket.  And we were REQUIRED 
to navigate to within 20 feet using a tactical map during tactics, as 
well use sectionals when going cross country.

I found myself in the 1st Cav Div shortly after graduation, enroute to 
Vietnam in September 1965 aboard a big boat.  After 35 days aboard that 
luxury liner we arrived in Quinh Nhon harbor, and after a couple days in 
the harbor waiting for the maintenance guys to put the aircraft back 
together, I, as a WO-1, and a crewchief in the left seat was directed to 
fly the aircraft off that little aircraft carrier as wingman on another 
UH-1 piloted by a young Captain who shall remain nameless.  Our 
destination was An Khe airport.  We flew up thru the An khe pass just 
out of Quinh Nhon on Hiway 19 toward An Khe.  The lead aircraft 
announced on the radio that he was landing at An Khe just after we wen 
over the pass.  I looked again at my map, saw that we were about 20  
miles short of An Khe, notified the young Captain, and told him I was 
continuing on to An Khe.  I got an over the air ass chewing, but he soon 
followed me on to An Khe, and we made it in there with 2 very overloaded 
UH-1's and after we got on the ground the young Captain apologized to me 
for the over the air ass chewing.  We were supposed to have at least 30 
days to get organized at An Khe, but in about 2 weeks, we were tasked to 
haul the 101St Brigade out of a couple LZ's to our west.  I was assigned 
as PIC on a UH-1 with a CW3 copilot who had never been in a UH-1.  I 
asked him if he wanted to start and take off and he told me he didn't 
have a clue as to how to do it, so I fired it up, made the take off, 
flew in formation out to the LZ, and made about 3 or 4 sorties hauling 
the 101st  brigade out.  The CW3 with me didn't want to handle the 
aircraft until we were on the way back to An Khe.  He flew it back and 
landed it, but thought it hovered different enough from an H34 that he 
wanted me to park it after we got back to An Khe.  In November, around 
mid month, we were tasked to support the Ia Drang Campaign.  All went 
well until our UH-1 was shot down in LZ Xray. We put it in through the 
trees about 40-50 yards to the west side of the LZ, hitched a ride out 
of there with CW3 Jimmy Johnson, flew back to Peiku, got in another UH-1 
and continued to fly until the day was over.  Next day, we were tasked 
to haul relief troops into LZ Albany and got the hell shot out of the 
aircraft, nobody got hurt, and were able to fly it out of there back to 
Pleiku. And so went the remainder of the year.  There was no cowboying, 
but we took a lot of calculated risks, most of us managed to survive it 
and we damn sure never left another crew on the ground, regardless of 
what aircraft they flew, or what branch of service. We picked up an F-4 
navigator after he punched out once. Unfortunately the pilot of the F-4 
never got out as we watched it explode against the side of a mountain.

John Hart

C/229 AHB 1965-66

48th AHC 1966

HHC 164th CAB 1970-71

  On 1/13/2019 10:06 AM, PAUL BIELECKI via Vhfcn-l wrote:)
> I think the cowboy was there in some units, as well as some individuals. I believe that some of us also considered the thought that the guys and ladies at times asking for help were our comrades in arms and needed our help. I know my crews always thought even if we got shot down we increased the count of American ground .troops by at least four. Sometimes my crew had an additional crew member depending on mission and equipment on board. We always carried additional weapons, and ammo even when I flew for Dustoff. The AF and Navy did things different than us at times and seemed to have more operational restrictions than the Army, though I did see come Army aviation groups have more operational restrictions than others. I know I enjoyed a great many liberties that with the units I flew for and with many of the missions flown, always had great crew members and supporting aircrews regardless of services.
>
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> ------ Original Message ------
>
> From: Darrell Elmore via Vhfcn-l
> To:PaulBielecki
> Cc: vhfcn-l at vhfcn.org
> Sent: January 12, 2019 at 2:46 PM
> Subject: Re: [Vhfcn-l] Comment from today's pilots
>
> Yeah, Vietnam was the cowboy time in Army Aviation.While I fully respect the aviators of the AF, Navy and USMC, none could collectively compare with magnificent (predominately) young men in their flying machines.Literally thousands of grunts and such are alive today due to the skills, audacity and balls of those crews.I have no doubt we lost crews and aircraft due to how they performed, but in the big picture we guys on the ground had full faith in those guys.We knew they would do what was necessary to support us as well as humanely possible - and maybe beyond that! Today all services are more like airlines, often more focused on checks in squares than operations. I saw it first hand when the Caribou was transferred from the Army to the AF. Overnight the SF and remote sites were never supported as well as before the turn over. Moe -----Original Message----- From: Don Armstrong via Vhfcn-l To: MoeElmore Cc: VHFCN1 Pilots and Crew Sent: Sat, Jan 12, 2019 12:38 pm Subject: [Vhfc
>   n-l] Com
> ment from today's pilotsOn another Facebook page someone had posted a link about Bruce Crandalland his actions that produced a CMH.Here is a comment that is very telling. Now a days he would have been. Grounded in the return of the first flight pending an 15-6, investigation, made RL3 because after being shot at and knowing he was hit ,he did not land ,he flew back to base......time have changed ,and I'm not sure for the better -- Don Armstrong cavman at dtroop35cav.org 604th Trans / 52nd CAB, Pleiku, Apr / July 68 D Troop 3/5 Cav, Bearcat /Dong Tam , July 68 May 69 http://www.dtroop35cav.org _______________________________________________ Vhfcn-l mailing list Vhfcn-l at vhfcn.org This message was delivered to MoeElmore at aol.com http://lists.vhfcn.org/mailman/listinfo/vhfcn-l _______________________________________________ Vhfcn-l mailing list Vhfcn-l at vhfcn.org This message was delivered to pbpilot27 at comcast.net http://lists.vhfcn.org/mailman/listinfo/vhfcn-l
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