Patrick Hull served as a helicopter crew chief with the "Phoenix", C Co, 158th Aviation Battalion, 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam from March 1969 to March 1970. The following pictures are from his collection, hope you enjoy them.............. L. Frazier You can reach Pat via e-mail at phull603@sbcglobal.net
| Pat Hull went to Rotary Wing Aircraft Maintenance School before going to Vietnam and chose to become a flying crew chief. Each crew chief was assigned to a helicopter and was responsible for it's maintenance regardless of what time of day or night it was. A typical crew chief was on the flight line with his bird before sunrise, and the last one to leave the flight line at night. Eating in the mess hall was rare, and having a good case of C-rations or Lrrps usually kept us going. | |
| The Huey required alot
of maintenance and went through a thorough inspection every 100 hours of flight time.
A crew chief usually got to spend some time with his helicopter when it went in the
hanger for maintenance. When there was a shortage of crew chiefs, you usually flew
on someone else's bird. Another reason to get to the flight line early was to protect your equipment. The 1st and 2nd flight platoons were always ripping each other off for microphone cords, etc.
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| Our company area was located East of the runway at Camp Evans, this is a shot of the backside of our Orderly Room. We had 'hooches" to sleep in night that were similar construction. (photo courtesy of Patrick Hull) |  |
| One of many of his jobs was to refuel the helicopter. This was always accomplished at POL with both pilots still strapped in, but all doors open and chair armament open in case of a fire etc. |  |
| A considerable amount of time was spent waiting for things to happen on standby status. Here, several Phoenix birds are sitting at LZ Foxy in the Ashau Valley waiting for a combat assault to Tiger Mountain. |  |
| The crew chief usually flew on the left side of the aircraft and had "the duty" to man and shoot an M60 machine gun as shown here. The guns were kept serviceable by a door gunner who didn't necessarily fly on the same helicopter each day. |  |
| Here's a view from the crew chief's well looking forward at the left seat pilot who usually was the aircraft commander. This particular photo is of CPT Randy House "Phoenix 16" who lead the evacuation of FSB Ripcord in July 70. This photo was taken months before that. |  |
| Our fearless pilots (we called them our drivers) took us places we and our passengers always didn't want to go. However, we never heard complaints when we showed up with water, food, mail from home, extra ammo, and medical supplies. We delivered hot meals on the holidays when we could, and even took cold sodas and ice cream to the troops on occasion. Note the "goofy grape" smoke in this picture designating a LZ (landing zone) in tight terrain on this mountain in the Roung Roung Valley. This area was known for RPG's. |  |
| This is an aerial view of Fire Support Base (FSB) Nuts, which was on the South end of the Ashau Valley. |  |
| Vietnam was a beautiful country, and the view from the crew chief's well was great. Here's a photo of the waterfall on Bach Ma Mountain. President Teddy Roosevelt used to go tiger hunting on this mountain. |  |
| T.O.C (Tactical Operations Center) on Bach Ma Mountain |  |
As you can see, we flew in and around all different kinds of terrain. One day you were flying in the flatlands, the next in the mountainous jungles. We had to contend with poor weather, clouds and fog, night time manuevers, etc. Many helicopters were lost in Vietnam due to human and mechanical errors. Still to this day, we give our pilots a tremendous amount of credit for getting us out of tight places. "Hover holes" were LZ's cut in the jungle that barely had room for a Huey to descend into and out of without chopping trees, landing on stumps that were left, etc. You constantly watched the main and tail rotors, tailboom, and skids for clearance. Loads, temperature, altitude, wind, and turbine engine power all were critical factors in getting in and out of these places safely.
| .Looking at the North end of the Ashau Valley. |  |
| The TaBat Airstrip in the Ashau Valley. |  |
| Here's a shot of a road in the Ashau Valley, amongst all the bomb craters. |  |
| Here is a picture of an APC in the Ashau Valley near FB Rendezvous. |  |
| Looking South into the Ashau Valley. This valley was home to the North Vietnamese most of the time. It was a beautiful but frightening place. |  |
| .Helicopters are an amazing piece of equipment, very complicated and requiring a lot of maintenance. Not all our helicopters came back from Vietnam, this one belonged to C Co, 101st Avn. Bn. "Black Widows" that crashed near FSB Rendezvous in the Ashau Valley. (photo courtesy of Patrick Hull) |  |
| .Here's another picture of the same crash. (photo courtesy of Patrick Hull) |  |
| .We routinely moved and resupplyed ARVN (South Vietnamese) troops. Communications were always a problem, although we got pretty good at getting our message across when it was time to un-ass the aircraft. These soldiers routinely tried to take all the comforts of home with them including live chickens, etc. |  |
One thing that Pat remembers well is how the grunts smelled of wet and woodsmoke. To this day, when he smells wet wood burning, he goes back to Vietnam.
| Here's a photo taken of helicopters leaving an LZ.) |  |
| Here's another picture of Phoenix helicopters coming back from a combat assault near the DMZ. We had day trips into Tchephone (Laos) long before the Lam Son Operations. Our helicopter assault companies took turns doing TDY (temporary duty) working for units based in Quang Tri which included the 1st Brigade of the 5th Mechanized Infantry Division, and Special Forces CCN. These assignments were usually for about two weeks at a time. When you wanted the very best, you asked for the 101st. |  |
| Hue was a beautiful ancient city, this photo shows the Providence Helicopter Pad. |  |
| An aerial shot of Hue City of what Pat calls the Yacht Club. |  |
| This photo shows a
temple located on the Perfume River near Hue. Some of our better duty was flying in
the flatlands away from the mountains and jungle. Pat tells the story of when they
landed at Pistol Pete (a Navy installation out on the coast) on Christmas day 1969.
While they were below deck having a nice meal, the sailors painted "MERRY XMAS
USN" on the belly of his helicopter. They got informed of this upon returning
to "the Nest" by our operations folks upstairs in the maintenance hanger.
He remembers trying to find Army green paint on Christmas to paint it over. We all knew the Navy had too much time on their hands, but we always appreciated the cold sodas they brought out for us when we landed on a hospital ship to deliver those that needed medivaced or the movies we used to borrow from them to be shown in our own company area at night. |
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| We kept our helicopters in revetments which were built to protect them from rockets, mortars, etc. Here's a peaceful shot of Brian Fitzgerald, a 1st Platoon crew chief, spending some time with his pup named "Cong" |  |
The above photos are the exclusive property of Patrick Hull and should not be copied without his permission. L. Frazier 08/12/00