E Flighter

I knew Ed from my work with ABX Air. Ed and I were in Miami on the DC-8. He always pulled his weight and then some.

We were doing rotations out of Clark (21TAS) in early 75 flying the klong. At that time a civilian outfit called Bird Air was flying resupply mission with USAF AWADS aircraft from U-Tapao to Phnom Penh. Of course it all ended with Operation Eagle Pull.

I was on the aircraft, 64-0556, that picked up Wessel's crew after their aircraft, 72-1297, was indirectly hit by the B40 on the taxiway at VVVS. The members of my crew that I recall were Greg Chase, Lynn Spence, Hanson. We were assigned to the 21 TAS. The 374 TAW units participating in the airlift were 21 TAS, 776 TAS and, out of Kadena the 345 TAS. The 50 TAS had just arrived at Clark and had not flown into VVVS when the field finally closed the night of the attack. We did not take a BLU-82 in; however, 72-1297 did. We arrived shortly after 72-1297 and were sitting at the loading area with the engines running and the ramp and door open waiting for our refugees. Greg told me to go out and talk to the CCT commander and see what the hold up was. I got about halfway to the jeep that the CCT was standing around when the first B40 rounds hit. The directive was if the field came under attack to get the airplane off the ground and back to RPMK. After the first rounds stopped, and they were reloading, I got up and started back toward my aircraft when I heard the engines winding down. My crew exited the aircraft via the ramp just as the second wave of rounds started to fall. Meanwhile the CCT commander was yelling get that f...... aircraft off my ramp. We got back in the aircraft but could not get the GTC started. As it turned out, in the heat of battle, it was forgotten that the GTC door was closed. Meanwhile, we were watching 1297 taxi from the bomb dump over to the loading area. It was obvious that the NVA were trying for 1297. As we finally got the gang bang engine start process going we saw 1297 coming toward the loading ramp on the parallel taxiway. A B40 round hit just behind the right wing of the aircraft. Some shrapnel from the round went through the right wing from below. I remember seeing several streams of fuel coming out of the right wing as big as your arm. When the fuel reached the point on the taxiway where the round had hit, it ignited. Wessel's crew evacuated the aircraft and ran up the taxiway toward our aircraft. By this time we had all four running and were just holding for Wessel's crew. We couldn't reach anybody in Tiger Ops for obvious reasons. We taxied out and did a max effort take off and spiraled up over the field. Once we were out of harms way and had enough altitude, we contacted Red Crown. Red Crown provided ATC and reliable NAVAIDS being all the in country NAVAIDS were unreliable having been over run by the rapidly advancing NVA. They informed us to go back and pick up the CCT. At this point we did not have enough fuel to comply. As it turned out, the Marines extracted the CCT via rotor wing the next day. After we got settled down I remember Larry Wessels saying, "The Pubs officer is going to kill me because my pubs burned up with the aircraft." It's kind of strange how the mind works in times of stress. 72-1297 was a Little Rock bird painted with the new MAC stripe across the tail. The 374TAW's aircraft were still assigned to PACAF at the time of this occurrence. We went under MAC in June of that year. I remember Larry commenting that 1297 was a very low time aircraft and still had the new smell inside of it. When we got back to Clark and debriefed Intel, I recall them speculating about it looking like a VNAF logo on the tail. There were also rumors that a COMSEC violation occurred disclosing the fact that the aircraft had a BLU-82 aboard. In any event, it was obvious that they were aiming for that aircraft. I have attached a couple of photos that the CCT took of 1297 after sunrise. They are attached: