Dec 5, 1967 2 downed UHIE ?

[Sparrowhawk]

Dec 5, 1967 2 downed UHIE's?

Unk location on this date, I mention in the book that a platoon from Mike Co 3/7 was sparrow hawked in to support two gun ships that were down (poss. west of Dai Loc?).

Another company was to be bald eagled by Ch-46's but weather prevented them from landing, one platoon did land, found one Huie totally destroyed (burned?) 4 crew members died in the crash 4 others were medevac.

Would like to know if anyone knows who they were?

What happened? Info is part of the story included from grunts point of view of what happened that day, would like to develop more of the content for historical references.

Cook Barela

cookbarela@hotmail.com

[JWatson]

Sent you an E-mail,hope it works..


SEMPER FI !! Jimmy

[Crazy Joe]

Go to POPASMOKE Homepage and click on KIA Incidents, page 3. Look for Gary England, he was pilot of the lead Huey. Click on his name and the Command Chronology should give you all the info you need.

"Ike" Terry, co-pilot, was my very good friend.

Semper Fi

"Crazy Joe" Scholle
HMM-363

[GEORGE CURTIS]

http://www.popasmoke.com/kia/inciden...ncident_id=104

[Sparrowhawk]

It fills in a few gaps.

And like all most of these recollections, they open up other questions and memories.

Saw the name

Morey Jr., Frank Ernest GySgt (PP) Gunner VMO-2 MAG-16 671205 (vvm 31E:041)

And wonder if he was the same Morey that helped us out on Operation Foster in the Arizona on November 19 & 21, 1967?

Wondered if the air force crash was the same one our platoon was send out to try and locate the Air Force officer of that downed aircraft that was supposedly taken POW by Charlie from a crash site. That aslo occurred near Charlies Ridge.

Never found the officer nor made contact with Charlie.

With time, it all runs together.

Thanks again

Cook

[dukelind]

I remember the incident. Both aircraft flew into a mountian during bad weather. 2nd aircraft saw lead crash and did a hell of a job stopping his rate of decent before he crashed. All in second aircraft survived. Contact Marv Pixton the pilot of that aircaft. Believe John Rohner was the copilot

Duke Lind

[Crazy Joe]

Marv Pixton was indeed pilot and John Rohner co-pilot. The story as was told to me 36 plus years ago was that Marv and John never saw the hill. The first thing thay saw was the first Huey exploding; they had just taken on a fresh load of rockets. The explosion of the lead Huey blew the nose of the second Huey up and it pancaked into the hill and then did an outside loop over the top of Charlie Ridge and rolled down the other side. I talked to both Marv and John years after the incident and I believe that's what they said also.

Semper Fi

"Crazy Joe" Scholle
HMM-363

[dukelind]

I remember VMO-2 looking into the incident. I believe they were on a radar vector from the facility at Monkey Mt. (don't remember their call sign). What no one in the flight knew and the controlling facility didn't tell them is that they had no altitude monitoring capability and vectored them into that mountain.

Duke Lind

[Crazy Joe]

Duke:

That's the first time in all these years that I've heard anyone mention that the aircraft might have been on a radar vector. I don't remember anyone at the time, or even years later, saying anything that they were talking to radar controllers. I guess Marv and John are the ones who would know, or perhaps also the crew chief and gunner if they were listening on their headsets.

Semper Fi.

"Crazy Joe" Scholle
HMM-363

[BenBrenneman]

Duke,

I seem to remember that Gary THOUGHT he was on a radar vector from Moon Man (? Marble Mt), but the reception back in there was so poor, they didn't realize that Moon Man was actually talking to some commercial plane, turning up from Hoy Ann(?) and landing at Da Nang. Marv may have told me that - can't remember.

BB

[dukelind]

Ben: you may be right but I still think they were getting a vector from someone. Marv will sort it out at the reunion.