Article Operation Frequent Wind 29 April 1975

[bdpopeye]

In 1975 I was ships company on board the USS Hancock (CVA-19). CVA= Attack Aircraft Carrier. She was homeported at NAS Alameda CA. In 1975 both Cambodia and Vietnam would fall to the communist.

The USN formed a 48 ship task force to evacuate Americans and other from these countries. The Operations were called "Eagle Pull" and "Frequent Wind". Hancock would be involved in both operations.

Hancock was lovingly called Hanna and Fightin' Hanna by the crew. Shipmates would fight for that ship. No BS, just fact..

If there are any slang terms in the post you do not understand I will gladly translate them. Or any other terms or words you do not understand feel free to ask.

I apologize in advance for anything that is posted that may be offensive to anyone.

I wrote the following in a yahoo US Navy group back in 1975. I'll try to edit it as best I can please excuse my mistakes..When I'm finished with the text of this recollection I will post a few photos..
________________________________________________
18 March 1975 Fightin' Hanna departs on the last WESPAC.......

On the cover of the cruise book it says .."The Last West Pac"..I was
there 47 years ago..This is going to be an on going log the next
couple of days of my experiences on the Hanna during
Operations Eagle Pull and Frequent Wind.

Yep.. It was gonna be a regular post Vietnam combat WESPAC. Lots of time in port.Yee haw!! Lotsa training. Boo Hiss!! Guys in G division were making plans on the stuff they were gonna buy in the Navy
exchange in Subic Bay. Some fools were vowing NEVER to go off base in Subic.

There was a even pool to see who would catch the "clap"(STD) first.
Guys were tellin' lies to boot campers about what to expect in 'Po
City.(Olongopo City, Philippines)

The best laid plans of mice and men were soon to change..

North Vietnam was over running the South. The fall of South
Vietnam was imimate{?}..And old Fightin' Hanna would be a major player in what was to come. We regular white hats had no idea at the time what was to come.

I remember standing on the flight deck in my dress blues manning
the rails not realizing that the Hanna would be makin' history once
more.

20 March 1975 Deep Purple! Deep Purple!! Hanna steams at 27 knots to Pearl Harbor

I remember waking up that morning and feeling a rumble. I
thought.."This boat is hauling ass or draggin' a screw!" I wondered
what was goin' on?... Went to the fantail. Sure enough the Old
Hanna was steaming!.The rooster tail was a site to behold..

I went down to the mess decks and man oh man "Mess Deck Intelligence"
a.k.a. MDI was in full effect...some of the rumors where.."We got
orders to go to Pearl and offload the Airwing then go to J-pan and
get some Marines".."Naw naw" another salt sez...'Were gonna off load
the whole airwing in Hawaii then go to PI and pick up some "Jar-
heads"." Nope" says another shipmate.."Were going to Pearl..Offload
the F-8's Onload Marine A-4's then go to 'Nam and bomb the crap
outta them!!"....So on and so forth. All half truths..We hadda to
hear the straight scoop from the skipper...

"Deep Purple! Deep Purple!" had been called away. That meant that all Departments heads, Air wing CO's ETC.. hadda report to the skipper to be briefed about something "heavy" i.e. something top secret commin' down.

Well the word was passed. Hancock was to proceed to Pearl. Off load
VF-24 & VF-211. Then onload HMH-463. Then proceed to Subic Bay at
all speed... Off load the entire Air Wing. On load more Marines. Head
to the Tonkin Gulf. Then standby for evacuation orders. Cambodia and
South Vietnam were about going to fall in the coming weeks..to the
Communist.

"Standby for a word from the Captain".. The skipper was Captain
Fred "Feild Day " Fellows. A very fair but strict skipper that stood
up for his men. Got some good stories about Capt. Fellows. Well the
skipper came on the 1MC that morning..like he should..To explain
what was happening. He did in a brief and concise way. The skipper
made it clear that he would pass on all info he could. He did as
time went on.

Poor Old Hanna had been suffering long list engineering problems
since I had been on there since August 1974.. We kept up 27 knots
for about a day and a half. Then we lost some boilers. Our speed was
reduced to 16-18 knots. .All in all not bad for a 31 year old ship that was built to be in service for about 5 years..

We arrived in Pearl Harbor Hawaii on 24 March 1975....

 

[bdpopeye]

26 March 1975, USS Hancock CVA-19 departs Pearl Harbor, HI and heads to the Subic Bay, Republic of the Philippines.

Well now the Hanna was loaded up with HMH-463 CH-53's and their squadron of 300 airdale Marines to support them and was heading to da' "PI"(Subic Bay, Philippines). The Marines had no problem adapting to Navy life. Most had been on a "float"{cruise/deployment}as they called it. They all said the Hanna was the cleanest ship they were ever on. They said gator freighters were POS(pieces of s**t). The Hanna being a CVA afforded the Marines more room than they ever had on a LPH. They were a couple of old, rusty crusty, dusty type SSgt/GySgt types that had been on an old straight deck 27c{Essex class carrier}...All in all the Marines adapted well
to the Hancock.

One of the things that HMH-463 hadda do on the way to Subic was repaint their birds with a non reflective paint. They did this on the fantail of the flight deck. The scooter{A-4 Skyhawk) types on board were afraid at first that overspray would get on their aircraft. And it did at first, But after a good respot the overspray problem was solved.

Rumors abounded on the way to Subic. The big one was no liberty in da' "PI" because we were on a 24 hour notice to get underway. Another was that we were really going to Okinawa to onload Marines.

Fact was Hanna was heading to the Philippines. And traveling at a reduced speed because of engineering woes the Hancock would not arrive in Subic until the 6th of April.

So we had plenty of time to ponder the rumor mill and what MDI was saying.

The trip to da' "PI" was not uneventful ..as we shall see...

 

[bdpopeye]

1 April 1975 Hancock steams towards the "P I"

Actually the word steaming is a misnomer. It was more like
chugging. We could only make about 19 knots because of our engineering
problems.

As we "chugged" past Guam some yard workers from Subic Bay in da' "PI" were flown out to old CVA-19 to start working on the engineering problems. But those boys were more interested in buys smokes(cigarettes) and such(Candy & food items) in the ships stores than fixing the Hanna.

Many of you guys made MED cruises back in the 60's and
70's..Right? And have seen the Russian Bears over fly the ship. Well as the Hanna steamed across the Pacific we were over flown by a Russian
Bear. I don't remember the date or the ships position. Well I think the
Hancock was in an alert 30 status. We could NOT launch the alert thirty
because of the condition of the flight deck. It was fouled with CH-53's
blocking the A-4's. Remember that our F-8 were off loaded in
Hawaii.

I don't know why the deck was in such bad shape. But after we were
over flown by the Bear a major respot was in order...more too come...

I once posted & boasted that I was never on a ship that was successfully overflown by the Russians. I was wrong. I had forgotten this incident

 

[bdpopeye]

5 April 1975 Hancock in near collision with USS Kawishiwi

Yes thats true. There are some conflicting stories about
that incident..

By my recollection we were along side the Kawishiwi about 1800 or so
to take on fuel and water. Oh yea the Hanna had to unrep water...I
was behind the island in the bomb farm watching the unrep.

It seemed to me that the Kawishiwi was very close and moving back and forth in a very calm sea state. I decided to go down to the shop..so as I got to the front of the island I heard a horn blast from the bridge then on the 1 MC & 5 MC I heard "Take a brace!!, Take a brace!!" The Hanna made a turn to port.

Next the collisional alarm was sounded but there was no
collision. Actually what had happend was the USS Kawishiwi had
lost steering and we had an emergency breakaway with them. We almost had a collision.

Some say our STBD aft aircraft elevator did hit the
Kawishiwi. I did not see any damage though.

Well I went down to the hangar deck and saw Bos'un mates covered in fuel. Fuel lines ruptured during the emergency & them fellas were covered with fuel & needed to be hosed down. I did not see any injuries.

Shortly the skipper passed the word on just what had happened.

The following was posted on a Hancock website by a QM2 Shaklett
who was on the bridge at the time of the near collision;

"I was that "Quartermaster at the helm" during the UNREP with
KAWISHIWI in '75. And believe me, it was the most difficult
evolution I had ever done!

According to our division chief (QMC Steve Brown), the problem was caused by KAWISHIWI losing power to her rudder and the venturi effect pulling the ships together.

I had only been on the helm about 10 minutes when things went wrong,
in a hurry. For the record, I was one of only six qualified Special
Evolution helmsmen on board. As you know, the Special Evolution
helmsmen have the responsibility for driving the ship in and out
of port, and taking the helm during Flight Ops and UNREPS. We would
generally have 2 or 3 Special Evolution helmsmen for each UNREP,
rotating every twenty minutes.

Here is what happened on the bridge. My compass heading would not hold, no matter what I did on the helm. I reported to the Conning Officer that I was unable to hold my course. But with each correction in the rudder, the lines and hoses between the ships would pull us closer together. Capt Fellows on seeing the danger, relieved the Conning Officer, because we were not gaining distance between ships fast enough. He ordered the
Quartermaster of the Watch to sound the Emergency Breakaway
signal on the ship's horn and ordered the 1MC announcement on the
breakaway. We successfully pulled away, after "All Ahead Flank,
Emergency" was ordered. The first and only time I had ever heard
that particular command. It's a funny thing, after writing this,
I remember it like it was yesterday. Hard to believe it's been 25
years!!! Only by speeding up and literally pulling away, did we
get out of harm's way. Our division Leading Petty Officer (QM2
Mende) wanted to relieve me in the middle of the breakaway, but Chief
Brown refused to let him on the helm. Mende thought I wasn't turning
the rudder fast enough. Capt Fellows was giving me rudder commands
every few seconds. And believe me, I had never done so many rudder
reversals in my life. My arms felt like lead.

The credit really goes to Capt Fellows for recognizing the danger we were in and directing me correctly on the helm. I later received a commendation from
him for expert performance on the helm.

I'm just glad there were no serious injuries.

Even though UNREPs can become routine, you must always be prepared for emergencies. I also want to give credit to Chief Brown for my training and his guidance. It saved the day.

Footnote: It should be noted that while I was doing my best to
keep up with rudder commands and course changes, my counterpart in
after-steering had to match everything I did on the bridge. The after-
steering gang really saved everyone, by staying alert and by keeping
both steering engines on line.

Fred Shacklett, QM2, N Division 1974-1976 (Last LPO of
N-Division

 

[bdpopeye]

6 April 1975 USS Hancock arrives at NAS Cubi Pt, Republic of the Philippines

NAS Cubi Pt RP was part of the massive Subic/Cubi Pt USN complex. We tied up at the Carrier pier in Cubi Pt. Cubi was about 10 miles from Subic Bay "main gate". Not to fret!!! It cost a nickel to catch a bus or it was a .75 cents taxi ride.. Or there were limited liberty buses.

Oh yea! Can you smell it!? We're in 'da P.I.!. Oh yeah!!
Liberty time! Our department had max liberty because all our spaces got
outstanding during zone inspection..Yahoo!! Ooppss!! Actually we
did have max liberty but the ship was on alert to get underway in 12
hours or something like that. So guess what? ALL hands liberty
expired on board at midnight the 3 days we would be in
P.I...That was way below average...Believe it or not I did not go on liberty..I did have Shore Patrol the second day inport.

While inport Weapons Dept big wigs planned the upcoming ammo off load
and onload. We hadda unload some of the fixed wing ordnance. Then onload
some helo weapons. Was not really that hard. An easy day for an ordanceman.

Mean time the rest of the airwing(CVW-21) left the ship and was billeted
at NAS Cubi Pt. More Marines came onboard as the Hanna was transformed
into an LPH of sorts...We had HMM-164 & 165 Ch-46's. HML-367 with their Cobras. And loads of 1st Battalion Marines{Grunts}..Things were happening at a quickening pace. All in all we had 40{I think}USMC helos by the
time we left P.I.

By the time we left 'da P.I. we knew what our mission was ...we
just did not know when it would happen.

 

[bdpopeye]

10 April 1975, Hancock is now an LPH!!!!!...

Well..not officially. But we were operating as an LPH. We had
departed Cubi Pt. RP on the 9th{I think}..coulda been the 10th.

Hangar bay three was full of pallets of diapers,baby
formula,medical and sanitary supplies. C-rations, blankets, cots..etc..most
anything you may need for a humanitarian effort was stored there.

In hangar bay one elements of the First Battalion Marines were living
there. Oh we had enough berthing on the Hanna for them but a lot of the
berthing vacated by the Airwing was reserved for the "Refugees"
So some,not all, the Marine "Grunts" were quartered in Hangar Bay
one.

Any way one of the first things we did at sea was off load some
of our fixed wing ammo in favor of helo ammo. This consisted mostly
of rockets, small arms and flares. I think we had to only empty two
or three magazines. I worked the flight deck during this evolution.
I was the hook up man during the vertrep. Basically I passed the
tether to the helo crewman hanging out the belly door on a
CH-46. I will never forget that on the bottom of HC-3's CH-46's was
painted the slogan.."Slipping the meat to the Fleet"..No kidding.

After the UNREP/CONREP the Hancock spent a lot of time operating
it's new Marine airwing in order to get the flight deck crew use
to handling strictly helos. We had to be ready because the first
evacuation "Operation Eagle Pull" would occur on the 12th of
April 1975. Fightin' Hanna would be ready!!

 

[bdpopeye]

12 April 1975 ..Operation Eagle Pull

The capitol of Cambodia was about to fall to the communist Khmer
Rouge. They had the city surrounded. The US fleet was standing
by to evacuate Americans and other foreign nationals out of the
country... as usual Hanna was ready.

HMH-463 from Hancock and HMH-462 from the USS Okinawa LPH-3
proceeded with the plan. CH-53's were used exclusively because
of their load capacity. Operation Eagle Pull went off on the
morning of 12 April 1975 without a hitch. 287 people were evacuated. No
evacuees were brought to the Hanna or Okinawa. Most were flown
to Thailand. For more info..

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,917322,00.html

As an AO on the flight deck our job was to assist the USMC
loading 50cal ammo in their birds. Just some minor league humping for an
ordie.

All we did was pull skids loaded with ammo cans to the
helos and hand the cans of ammo to the flight crew. Simple.

One thing that bothered me though was that EVERY night when helo ops secured we hadda to download the ammo and strike it below. I always wondered if we were on alert why did we have to do this?

The other Avation Ordancemen of G Division, Flight Deck Ordanance" were , AO2 Harry Depaw(LPO), AO3 Micheal Hagan, AO3 Hollowell, AOAN Hartman & AN Howell...Good crew.. Our jersyes were RED and stenciled on the front and back it read;

G DIV
FLT DK ORD

The American military involvement in Southeast Asia was soon to end...

 

[bdpopeye]

Hancock was inport in Singapore from 16-18 April 1975.

Hanna pulled into Singapore on the 16th of April for some well deserved R & R. Singapore in 1975 was not the Singapore you modern sailors know today. It was a changing metropolis. But still somewhat seedy..'Nuff said about that. We were to be inport 6 days..or so we thought!

I remember none of the Grunt Marines had civies with them. So civilians came onboard and sold them clothing.

No one knew when the operation in Vietnam would take place. Most our time at sea had been spent practicing for the evacuation...Singapore was a welcomed relief from the constant drilling for the event..

Suddenly on the 18th of April on Hanna.."Deep Purple!!..Deep Purple!!"..The word was passed..Hanna was placed on 4 hour alert..that meant that we had to get underway immediately! Trouble was probably half the crew was ashore. The word was passed throughout Singapore.."All Hancock men return to your ship immediately by order of the commanding officer"..Well the sailors and Marines ashore responded in kind. Amazingly >>> Not a single Hanna sailor or Marine was left ashore!!

The USS Hancock CVA-19 answered the call one last time. The ship was underway at 2030 that evening!! Those snipes got that old ship cranked up one more time. The black stack smoke belched...The rooster tail was high as Hanna steamed across the waves at 27 knots to the Tonkin Gulf....one last time...

All hands feel free to post comments or ask questions. Tomorrow I'll post the rest of the story...

Fightin' Hanna as a CVA in her normal configuration..circa 1969.

USS Hancock (CVA-19) outfitted as an LPH for operations Frequent Wind and Eagle Pull...April 1975...popeye was there.

 

[bdpopeye]

Operation Frequent Wind was the evacuation of Americans, Vietnamese and third country nationals by helicopter from South Vietnam on 29 April 1975.

1,373 U.S. citizens and 5,595 Vietnamese and third country nationals were evacuated by USMC, USAF and Air America helicopters to U.S. Navy ships off-shore in an approximately 24-hour period on April 29-30, 1975, immediately preceding the fall of Saigon.

I, Big Daddy Popeye was there..42 years ago. I was stationed aboard the USS Hancock CVA-19. An old WWll Essex class CV.

This is what occuried on the flight deck of the USS Hancock CVA-19 during Operation Frequent Wind. I was assigned to "G" Division flight deck crew. "G" division is comprised of Aviation Ordanceman. We handle Aviation ammo. This story is written as best as I can remember...

29 April 1975 of that day my friend one Mr Jimmy Bishop said..""Was that ever one of the sadist days of my life.. Remember seeing{on Tv}
them shove UH-1B's over the side of one of the carriers because they
were running out of room to operate.I was having a cold brewski at
this little Irish Pub named McGoo's...seems like yesterday""

About 0530 on board the USS Hancock CVA-19 on 29 April 1975 AO2 Harry Depaw awoke me and told me it's time to get to work. Oh joy,oh joy!! Another day of loading .50 cal ammo and waiting. It had been more than 10 days since we left Singapore. All old Hanna was doing was cutting doughnuts in the Tonkin Gulf and waiting for Saigon to fall.

Meanwhile in Saigon US Ambassador Martin knew the end was near.The North Vietnamese forces were getting closer to Saigon. It was just a matter of time before he would have to tell Washington to order the evacuation of Saigon. That occurred at 1000 that morning when he called Sec. Of state Henry Kessinger..

Deep Purple !! Deep Purple!! Was called away on the USS Hancock CVA-19 at about 1100. ..Operation Frequent wind was under way! Fightin' Hanna would answer the call one more time.

My job was to load up the USMC helos with .50 cal ammo. Then I was to man the deck edge bomb elevator forward of the island and place evacuee luggage on it after it had been inspected. Well WE all did more than that that day.

The sky was soon filled with USMC helos, some filled with "Grunt" Marines to secure & establish landing zones in designated areas "in country". I will not ever forget the sight of all those ships..48..and all those helos.

Jimmy mentioned seeing helo's being pushed overboard. That was on the USS Hancock CVA-19 and the USS Midway CVA-41. We had to push 19 of the Republic of South Vietnam(RVN) helo's overboard. 2 Chinook's and 17 Huey's. They were clogging the deck. Plus they had no landing gear{wheels}. Just skids. When the first RVN Huey's landed they were dragged to the bow and spotted there. As more and more helos arrived it became apparent that we could not keep the RVN helos and recover our own USMC helos. So when a RVN CH-47 Chinook landed with its non-folding blades we pushed it off the fantail. It ripped the safety netting off the round down on the fantail. It made a big splash when it hit the water. That helo's starboard engine was on fire. When that helo was circling ole Hanna' there was a 50 cal machine gun that was manned and ready pointing out of the starboard forward door. Smoke was bellowing out of that starboard engine. Capt. "Field Day" Fred Fellows called the ship to GQ over that.

I once read another internet account that claimed that these helos were salvaged first for parts. This is not true. We did not have the time. We simply pushed many of the RVN helos into the Tonkin Gulf. Period. Another account claims a Cessna landed on the Hancock. Not true. The Cessna actually landed on the USS Midway CVA-41. I know. I was on that flight deck for 29 straight hours. Click the link below for pic of the Evacuation on the Midway.

http://www.midwaysailor.com/midway1970/frequentwind.html

But when the nice pretty silver and blue Air America Huey's started coming aboard they were dragged to the bow and spotted there. A lot of those Air America pilots were drunk. It is a wonder that none of their helos crashed. We could not souvenir hunt in those birds like we did the RVN helos that we did keep.

When the RVN officers & families & Civilians etc starting really arriving in droves. Many were ARMED. You name it.. they had it!! A lot of 45's,38's,9mm,22's.. sawed offed Remington shot guns. I saw a so sweet .357 Colt Python with a six in barrel. I saw a lot Of knives. The Jar heads..OOPPSS I mean the Marines were in charge of searching the evacuees. They had this box to put the weapons in. Well you know Marines & sailors. Some marine "Confiscated" that Colt Python. Most of the weapons were thrown overboard.{Sic} I did not get any weapons because I was being stationed in Cubi Pt. And did not want to take a chance on getting busted. Most of the RVN military,civilians and American evacuees had large sum of cash and gold. After the evacuees were searched they were sent down to the Hangar deck were they were deloused and quartered. Some were placed in vacated berthing spaces.

Later that evening after the dust had settled a USMC CH-46 flying plane guard crashed just off the port side of the Hancock. Two crewman were lost. A Memorial service was held for the lost crewman on our way back to Subic.

All in all we wound up with over 2000 evacuees on the Hancock. One child was born to a Vietnamese woman on the Hancock. What was he named? John Hancock...

Big Daddy Popeye USN/retired
USS Hancock CVA-19.... AUG'74 'til Aug '75

 

[bdpopeye]

The planning for Operation Frequent Wind started long before the operation started..in March 1975. the Original intent was to evacuate about 1250 American and a similar number of other country nationals. However the final tally was about 7,000 people. there were plenty of supplies and support for those evacuated to the Seventh fleet ships in the Tonkin Gulf. After the Operation evacuees were taken to the Philippines or Guam. Most were later immigrated to the US.

Operation Frequent Wind Summary of the Evacuation 1262

These ships were present during Operation Frequent Wind. This is quite a force by anyone's measure..

USS ENTERPRISE (CVAN-65)
USS Hancock (CVA-19)
USS CORAL SEA (CV-43)
USS MIDWAY (CV-41)
USS OKINAWA (LPH-3)
USS Blue Ridge LCC-19
USS ROWAN (DD-782)
USS HENRY B. WILSON (DD-782)
USS WORDEN (DLG-18)
USS RATHBURNE (DE- 1057)
USS COOK (DE-1083)
USS BAUSELL (DD-845)
USS JOHN PAUL JONES (DDG-32)
USS KNOX (DE-1052)
USS REASONER (DE- 1063)
USS RAMSEY (DEG-2)
USS BLUE RIDGE (LCC-19)
USS DULUTH (LPD-6)
USS THOMASTON (LSK-28)
USS FREDERICK (LST-1 184)
USS DURHAM (LKA-114)
USS DUBUQUE (LPD-8)
USS ANCHORAGE (LSD-36)
USS TUSCALOOSA (LST- 1187)
USS FLINT (AE-32)
USS ABNAKI (ATF-96)
USS PRAIRIE (AD-15)
USS VEGA (AF-59)
USS QUAPAW (ATF-110)
USS RICHARD B. ANDERSON (DD-786)
USS BENJAMIN STODDARD (DDG-22)
USS BRONSTEIN (DE-1037)
USS LANG (DE-1060)
USS GURKE (DD-783)
USS COCHRANE (DDG-21)
USS GRIDLEY (DLG-21)
USS MEYERKORD (DE-1058)
USS KIRK (DE-1087)
USS OKLAHOMA CITY (CLG-5)
USS MOBILE (LKA-115)
USS DENVER (LPD-9)
USS MOUNT VERNON (LSD-39)
USS BARBOUR COUNTY (LST-1195)
USS VANCOUVER (LPD-2)
USS PEORIA (LST-1183)
USS HAKEAKALA (AE-25)
USS MARS (AFS-1)
USS ASHTABULA (AO-15)
USS MOUNT HOOD (AE-29)
USS WHITE PLAINS (AFS-4)
USS KAWISHIWI (AO-146)

Enterprise and Coral Sea supplied air-cover in case of any attack on US Forces.

Of this list only the Blue Ridge remains in service.

 

[bdpopeye]

USMC CH-53 of HMH 463 on the Hancock 29 April 1975 unloading evacuees.

More refugees on the USS Midway CVA-41

Midways flight deck crowded with USAF and USMC CH-53 ready to launch.

Republic of S. Vietnam "Huey" being pushed over the side on the USS Hancock.
We pushed 17 Hueys and 2 CH-47 "Chinooks" over the side because there was not enough room on the flight deck.

 

[Bombardier]

Brilliant article, I really enjoyed reading that @bdpopeye

 

[bdpopeye]

Major Buang's Bird Dog landing on the USS Midway (29 April 1975)

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This aircraft is preserved in the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola FL.

 

[bdpopeye]

Brilliant article, I really enjoyed reading that @bdpopeye

Thank you for the kind words!

More...

This is a pic of Air America(CIA) helos that were recovered from Vietnam on the helo flight line in NAS Cubi Pt. Philippines. I was stationed in Cubi from 8-'75 til 9-'77. These helos stayed on the helo flight line until early '76 if memory serves me correctly. Note the silver and blue paint scheme.

We had to shove those ARVN Hueys over the side. We had to keep enough deck space to recover our USMC helos after the operation. Plus they did not have wheels..just skids and they were tearing up the deck. We did save quite a few and packed them on board. Mostly Air America Huey's..

Best pic of an Air America helo I can find. We were not permitted to push these helos into the Tonkin Gulf. The paint scheme was quite striking. Many of the Air America pilots were drunk or stoned when they landed on the Hancock. No kidding. But what could ya' do? They were the friggin' CIA. This link will give you much info on the real "Air America".

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...ons/csi-studies/studies/winter99-00/art7.html

 

[bdpopeye]

Anyone want to know what Deep Purple was the call to action aboard Hancock? Here's why..

Smoke On The Water
Deep Purple
We all came out to Montreux
On the Lake Geneva shoreline
To make records with a mobile
We didn't have much time
Frank Zappa and the Mothers
Were at the best place around
But some stupid with a flare gun
Burned the place to the ground
Smoke on the water, a fire in the sky
Smoke on the water
They burned down the gambling house
It died with an awful sound
Funky Claude was running in and out
Pulling kids out the ground
When it all was over
We had to find another place
But Swiss time was running out
It seemed that we would lose the race
Smoke on the water, a fire in the sky
Smoke on the water
We ended up at the Grand Hotel
It was empty, cold and bare
But with the Rolling truck Stones thing just outside
Making our music there
With a few red lights, a few old beds
We made a place to sweat
No matter what we get out of this
I know, I know we'll never forget
Smoke on the water, a fire in the sky
Smoke on the water

Back in the day we called Smoke on the Water the national Anthem of the Philippines. because all the bars and night clubs in Olongopo City were playing that tune....someone aboard Fightin' Hanna used that song as a call to important meeting requiring immediate action.... and it stuck.

 

[Bombardier]

Cool pics, the video of Major Ly Bung's landing looked very hairy

 

[bdpopeye]

Marines standing by aboard USS Midway.

ARVN Huey approaching USS Kirk(FFG-1087).

ARVN being disposed of aboard USS Blue Ridge.

ARVN Chinook being shove off the Fantail of USS Hancock. I helped shove her off..

 

[bdpopeye]

Aboard USS Hancock (CVA 19)..Fightin' Hanna...

 

[bdpopeye]

Another Chinook goes down to Davy Jones locker courtesy of Midway sailors...

Marines searching Vietnamese arrivals aboard Hancock.

 

[Bombardier]

Excellent set of photos although it seems such a sad waste throwing those birds over board
I understand they needed the space though