|
Hornet 33 Memoir of a Combat Helicopter Pilot in Vietnam by Ed Denny Soft Cover
Hornet 33 Memoir of a Combat Helicopter Pilot in Vietnam by Ed Denny
Soft Cover
281 pages
Copyright 2016
CONTENTS
Mapsx & xi
Preface1
1. Whiskey Shots, Playing Slots, Coin Toss5
2. Getting Shot At: Just Take It10
3. White-Knuckle Formation Flying16
4. Mental Degeneration into Looney Land21
5. New Guy Extra Duties27
6. Helicopters on the Moon, Nixon's Cambodia, First Day33
7. More New Guy Extra Duties41
8. The Guard Towers, Being Insane50
9. Dead, First Day, First Minutes56
10. Flight Hours Clerk60
11. ACs Flew Left Seat: Hello, Americal Division64
12. Shoot at a Hornet, You Die72
13. New Platoon Leader Temporary77
14. Kham Duc Briefing, Letters Home80
15. AC Transition, Final Ride, Dennis Plumber88
16. Sappers at Kham Duc92
17. The Jeep and Larry Hood's First Day as AC94
18. Death, Don't Come Knocking: Serna and Larraga103
19. Leon Richards, the Snake-Eater, Was Gone Like Smoke107
20. IP School109
21. First Check Rides 114
22. Death Comes to the Hornets Again: Koch119
23. R&R Was Coming Soon, Concussion Grenade123
24. Flying Graves Registration127
25. Attempted Murder: The Fragging130
26. R&R Hawaii: Hot Sun Outside, Freezing Inside134
27. Flares All Night140
28. Cut Me, Cut Me, Go Ahead145
29. Hood's Check Ride, Screaming Woman149
30. Aviation Safety Officer SchoolCaptain Salmond155
31. Medals for All the Wrong Reasons162
32. Gunship Body Count: Like a Deer Tied to the Fender166
33. NVA Marching Down the Open Road171
34. Good Vibrations, South Vietnamese Pilot176
35. Out at Hawk Hill, After Midnight185
36. Stealing Food Over the Holidays191
37. The Khe Sanh Series: Quang Tri Rockets194
38. CO Office, CW2 Denny203
39. The Khe Sanh Series: Largest Armada205
40. Watching the Fly-By from the Deck227
41. Nurse in White Satin232
42. The Khe Sanh Series: Machete-Man238
43. Jet Airliner: Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam, to Fort Lewis, Washington, USA 260
44. Jet Airliner: Denver Airport, I'll Be Home Tonight, Baby265
45. My Wife, Our Apartment, Back in the World269
Index 279
PREFACE
In the fall of 1994,I was admitted to the Dallas VA Medical Center for treatment of suspected posttraumatic stress disorder 23 years after I had been in the Vietnam War. My doctor, a PhD psychologist with over 25 years of experience in treating such disorders, submitted a VA PTSD disability claim form on my behalf to the Waco, Texas, Veterans Affairs Regional Office for processing. The VA responded after a (long) time with instructions for me to submit a written account of any purported traumatic events I claimed to have experienced in Vietnam with dates and times of the claimed event(s), the exact place of the event(s), with witness statements verifying what occurred. Events, dates, and places: after 23 years, I couldn't say for sure exactly where or when anything happened. Witnesses: how in the hell could I hope to find or contact anyone I knew back in Vietnam, much less get a written statement from them?
I tried to write something, but I couldn't get beyond the very beginning of any account of my war experiences. I had just spent 23 years of my life doing everything possible to erase any memory of my time in the Vietnam War totally out of my mind. My year in Southeast Asia had not been a single day longer than my year spent in the third grade, and I wanted it to play no larger role in my life and memories than the time I was in elementary school. I guess that was an unrealistic expectation, an apples versus oranges comparison sort of situation. What I wound up with was a useless pile of a few scribbled notes.
Now, 21 years later, in 2015, after a zillion starts and stops, I have finished the story of what I experienced in Vietnam flying Huey's for the 116th Assault Helicopter Company, the Hornets, specifically the Wasp Platoon of the Hornets. At the time I was flying with them, I thought I was lucky to be with such a great helicopter company. The Hornets had been in Vietnam as long as anyone, and they knew exactly how to get business done as safely as possible. The Hornets won every fight we were ever in when I was there. We flew into the mouth of hell many times and came out the other side every time, leaving a sprawling count of dead enemy in our wake. For the enemy on the ground saw that it was the Hornets coming for them, it must have been like seeing terror coming out of the sky to dispatch them to their stinking little afterlife. For any enemy survivors of combat with the Hornets, the PTSD dreams that wake them up screaming in the dark of night has to be the vision of a giant Hornets helicopter coming for them.
From that first pile of scribbled notes, over the years, I eventually stacked up 85 sets of notes of events in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos as a form of emersion therapy to at least confront the crap that was bothering me. After a year of intensive PTSD treatment by the VA, my doctor finally told me that my PTSD was in the category of being a case of all the King's horses and all the King's men sort of deal. I was a Humpty Dumpty case. Life wasn't always fair to everyone. For some people, shit happens. You couldn't do anything about what happened in the past. The best thing you could do was understand it, learn everything you could about it, and learn how to cope with the situation. Basically, he was saying, "Just take it." Then we went into strategies about living with PTSD. He said it was like getting your legs blown off in a war. He couldn't give me new legs. The best thing that could be done was to teach me how to use prosthetic legs to walk again, and maybe someday I would run again. Getting my Vietnam experiences out of my head and out into the open was step one in learning to walk on prosthetic legs again. Confront the crap. I eventually worked on those 85 sets of notes until I had a very long set of separate stories.
I have finally distilled all 85 separate stories into a series of 45 interconnected chapters to make a book of a reasonable length. There are still 40 chapters not in this book because they were redundant. How many times can a person say that the bastards tried to shoot me again and missed by a couple of inches one more time, or some damned LZ went hot and turned into pure chaos: that would have been too many times.
In the spirit of Detective Joe Friday from the TV show Dragnet, I've tried to give just the facts, sir. And like Joe Friday, I've changed the names of some of the characters to protect the innocent. The following names are pseudonyms given to real people who are included in this book:
1st Lieutenant Sparks WO Leon Richards WO Dennis Plumber
WO Gary NewtonWO Randy Walker WO Austin Scarborough
WO Larry HoodWO Bob SkylesWife, Jane Denny
U.S. Army nurse Captain Bobbie Sue Wolters Stinger 82 gunship commander Arthur, and Sunny and Bobby Barrera
With the exception of the above listed pseudonyms, the events and details of the story in this book are all factual and as accurate as my memory can recall them. Nothing has been exaggerated, embellished, or glorified. It is just the facts, Detective Friday.
This collection of memories in no way tells the whole story of the Hornets during my time with them: it is just the little role I played as a Hornet. There was so much more than I could start to relate here. Maybe someday someone will tell a fuller history of the Hornets, the 116th Assault Helicopter Company, because they were a great group of "good ole boys" trying to do their best, and it was my great honor to be one of them for a while. For the men I knew who died during my year of flying in Vietnam, I guess I will go to my grave with those men still wandering the darkest reaches of my worst nightmares.
And to the makers of C-Rations: I just want you bunch of sadists to know that I have not opened one single can of 25-year-old spaghetti since I left Vietnam, and I never plan to either.
* * *
My military history is brief. I was drafted (then enlisted) in January 1969 and went to basic training at Folk Polk, Louisiana, and then to helicopter flight school in Fort Wolters, Texas, and Fort Rucker, Alabama. From flight school, I went directly to Vietnam on March 30, 1970, through March 30, 1971, and was discharged when I returned to the States at Fort Lewis, Washington: a 35 month early-out, for which I was very grateful.
All pictures are of the actual item. There may be reflection from the lights in some photos. We try to take photos of any damage. If this is a railroad item, this material is obsolete and no longer in use by the railroad. Please email with questions. Publishers of Train Shed Cyclopedias and Stephans Railroad Directories. Large inventory of railroad books and magazines. Thank you for buying from us.
Shipping charges
US Shipments: When you add multiple items to your cart, the reduced shipping charges will automatically be calculated. For direct postage rates to other countries, send me an email. Shipping varies by weight.
Terms and conditions
All sales are final. Returns accepted if item is not as described. Contact us before making a return. No warranty is stated or implied. Please e-mail us with any questions before bidding or buying.
Thanks for looking at our items.
|