Huey Crash'sss

[39mto39g]

While in the land of OZZ, I was in two hues when it was there time for gravity to come to the front.
While at Dak To
Dak To had a very big area where hueys could land and pick up everything from GIs to Water, When we did an assult to some area we would assemble and hueys would come and pick us up and we would go to where every we were sent, One fine day we got to take the Vietnam Taxi and did a 360 of the area and set down, We started to clear the area and set up kill zones, like we did 100 times, The LT gets a call to go back and get some paper work (for your eyes only) Well me and him get on the next huey in and head back to Dak To, While comming in to the landing area the huey shuddered and then fell like a rock about 20-30 feet, It bent both skids almost straight out and the tail roter exploded when it hit the ground, It didn't tip over and ever one was ok, except the huey was really short now. We got the LTs paper work and headed back to our guys, The LT asked the pilot what happened to the huey that crashed and he said the trainsmission went out? Hell I didn't know they had a trainsmission. Good thing it didn't happen at 1000 feet.

Huey crash 2 when I get back from the beer store.

Ron

[Desdichado]

We lost a tail rotor once. Literally. We were at 500 feet. The image of it that's seared into my mind is, as we started to spin, the helmets of the passengers - how they seemed to hang there in mid-air for a second, as if weightless, before disappearing out the door like they just thought of some place better to be. Weirdest thing. Pilots did a nice autorotate and got us down in one piece though. Those guys were good. The thick slime we "landed" in helped too.

[onesix]

That's how many choppers we lost in Vietnam. This could be a long thread.

[39mto39g]

The other huey crash I was in was lifting off the top of some mountain , Pick one, they all looked alike, We were standing on the ridge line of this mountain and the huey calls me and said the wind was at 65 kotts about 30 feet above us and this would be a tricky landing, he wanted everyone to move back, So I told Lt what he said and Lt moved every one back. The Huey landed (didn't look any different to me) We get on. This mountain was about 5-6000 feet with a long valley running straight away from it in the middle of the ridge line. We lift off and start nose down straight down the valley. We start to take fire. The tracers were flying by, the door gunner was talking back, and then, and then, we took something in the engine, I watched the pilot put up his hands like someone had a gun on him and he was surendering. We fell straight down the vally to the bottom, Just before the ground the pilot pulls back on his stick very hard cause the huey reared back on its tail and then hit on its skids, the thing rolled on its right side, We all got out as soon as we could and lifted the huey off the right side door gunners leg, More help arrived and we secured the area? We baby sit the huey all night and the next morning I hooked up a sling to a chinook to hall the huey out of there. We got a ride on another huey, Door gunner had a broke leg, that was the only casualty, Not very exciting, I guess ya had to be there.

Ron