It’s 0400 hours somewhere in South Vietnam.
I try my best not to look down between my feet at the jungle canopy rushing by below,
remembering that the only thing keeping me safely inside this helicopter is centrifugal
force and a very tight grip on a handhold jutting out of the floor.
Beside me the door gunner is safely strapped in with a complex harness, same as his M60
which is held in place by a series of bunjee straps.
The rest of us grunts are holding on for dear life, and I don’t want to think about the
consequences of a tumble out the wide open sides of the Huey.
Air assault is a pretty new thing at this point, the US saw great potential in the helicopter
and immediately developed a whole brand new doctrine of warfare utilizing air-lifted troops
moving on fast, agile helicopters.
Vietcong and North Vietnamese forces have frequently found themselves making contact
with US ground troops only to be outflanked by air assault infantry.
Sometimes we have straps that hook up to our harnesses, we call these monkey tails, but
when you get a call this hot there’s never time to strap in.
You just grab your gear and run, fitting as many soldiers on a chopper as possible and
knowing that every second you waste getting to the target is more American lives lost
on the ground.
This call is, as they increasingly are, from a firebase somewhere near the border.
The base is being held by a reinforced platoon, and estimates of enemy size range in the hundreds.
That’s not too unbelievable either, US units are routinely facing forces three to four
times their own size, but the incredible US firepower more than levels the playing field.
Truth is, we’re winning this war in every area but the two that count: politically and
in the minds of everyone back home.
North Vietnam is close to total collapse, and even the Vietcong are increasingly growing
desperate.
But the South Vietnamese government is completely useless and ineffective, and folks back home
are sick and tired of sending loved ones overseas only to get back body bags in return.
I’m shaken out of my thoughts as we near the LZ.
It’s still pitch black, but you can clearly see the firebase under assault several miles
ahead.
Tracers from M60 and .50 cal gunners light up the wide killing fields soldiers cut or
burned down shortly after establishing the fire base.
Mortars impact both on the firebase and at the enemy assault outside of it.
Both sides are giving each other absolute hell, but I know one thing: I wouldn’t want
to be the dumb sum’a bitch getting thrown into the teeth of all this defensive firepower.
A jet’s scream cuts through even the incredible noise of the man-made hurricane keeping my
Huey in the air, and a moment later there’s a dull ‘whump’ sound and a bright flash
of light as a football field sized area of the jungle goes up in flames.
Liquid fire lights up the early morning and I can really see the scope of the assault
for the first time.
The firebase is completely surrounded, but it looks like the main force of the attack
is coming from the western sector, where US troops hadn’t yet had a chance to finish
clear-cutting their defensive fields of fire.
The jungle grows closest to the base there, and the enemy is using the cover to their
advantage.
Or, at least they were until several hundred gallons of napalm fell on their heads courtesy
of the US Air Force.
We won’t be pulling any flanking maneuvers tonight, landing outside the wire would be
suicide, and with each Huey loaded with up to 15 troops, there’s not nearly enough
of us in the three aircraft to do anything but serve as a temporary distraction.
The Hueys are aiming to land inside the wire and drop us off, before flying back and ferrying
a fresh load of reinforcements.
They’re only supposed to carry 12 infantry along with the flight crew, but we’re only
loaded with rifles and ammo, and in an emergency, well regs can have a certain amount of flexibility.
The door gunners on all three Hueys open up almost as if on cue.
We’re close enough now to officially be part of the fight, and tracers are already
reaching up to the sky around us.
The big M60 machine guns spit out steady streams of death, but the jungle cover is thick and
it’s impossible to identify targets.
Instead, the gunners concentrate their fire on the origin of the groundfire from below.
Quite a few machine guns reaching up at us go quiet, many don’t, and the air is quickly
becoming a very dangerous place to be.
To make themselves a more difficult target, the Hueys drop to the deck, skimming the treetops.
I swear I can hear the sound of leaves brushing the bottom of my chopper.
Here the pilot has no technical assistance, he’s flying on pure instinct and balls so
big it’s a wonder the chopper has the lift capacity to carry them.
Instinctively I tug my legs up, the tops of the trees are uncomfortably close.
A few rpgs scream up at us from below, but we’re so low to the ground and moving so
fast, they are completely useless.
The pilots are slowing though as they prepare to land inside the firebase itself- if they
continue at a high rate of speed they’ll completely overshoot or have to perform a
slowing maneuver loitering above the base and making each chopper a magnet for fire.
Better to slow down now and get on the ground as quick as possible.
My vantage point on the left side of the huey lets me see ahead and to the left of the chopper.
We’re close to the base, and by my estimation we’ve slowed to below a hundred miles an
hour.
As I peer ahead I catch a glimpse of an oddly growing tree limb, rising above the canopy
a few meters to the left of the chopper, and making a sharp right turn in our direction.
With his concentration on the terrain directly ahead, I know the pilot doesn’t see it.
My brain does the calculations in a fraction of a second, and in an instant I know the
truth: we’re going to hit that limb.
I get a mental picture of the helicopter itself and figure that it’s going to strike the
landing skid right below me.
I’m expecting a harsh jolt perhaps, I couldn’t be more wrong.
We can clearly see details of the firebase’s defenses now, and the chopper is slowing down
significantly, shedding speed every second.
That’s probably what saved my life.
The unseen branch strikes with the landing skid, managing to strike the structural element
that connects the skids with the belly of the helicopter.
The entire machine suddenly, and very violently lurches to the left from the impact, and the
engine whines in protest as the pilot immediately applies power to try and correct the flight
path.
The impact sends a terrible vibration throughout the aircraft, and my grip on the makeshift
handhold weakens severely.
I hang on for dear life, but as the chopper spins uncontrollably to the right, I can’t
keep my grip and next thing I know, I’m no longer inside the helicopter.
Interestingly enough, as I feel myself falling, I don’t think about dying, but rather I
remember one of the very first orders given to me after air assault training.
An air assault infantryman is under no circumstances allowed to exit the helicopter except upon
successful insertion.
It was supposed to be a joke, and as I plummet to my death in the darkness below, I find
myself snickering.
I crash through the upper branches of a tall jungle tree, at, I don’t know but if I had
to guess it’d easily be several dozen miles an hour.
The branches viciously whip at my body and face, tearing through the cloth of my uniform
with ease.
In theory, if I can hit enough branches on the way down, I should slow down enough to
survive the fall.
In theory, it’s a good theory.
I must have slowed down though, and to this day I’m grateful I hit a particularly tall
tree.
When I make my first impact with one of the thicker, lower branches, the fact that I don’t
immediately die tells me that I’ve indeed slowed down significantly.
I strike the side of a thicker branch and the air gets knocked out of me.
It spins me around and now I’m falling facing down.
I clutch my M16 to my chest and shut my eyes.
I smash into another, thicker branch, striking the M16 dead center and driving the rifle
into my chest.
The impact is enough to crack the tough upper receiver, and likely several of my ribs, but
it slows me down even more.
Now I’m tumbling, and my feet strike a limb next.
Despite still moving at a very high rate of speed, it feels like my mind is moving even
faster, slowing down reality and allowing me to fully process the horror of my tumble.
I know instantly that both ankles have been shattered.
That strike tumbles me once more, and I spin backwards, striking yet another limb with
my back, and then a second, third, and finally- the ground.
It takes me a moment to realize that I’m alive, and as the pain comes flooding in,
I wonder just how long I’ll stay that way.
My rifle’s gone, ripped out of my arms and tossed somewhere unknown.
My harness carrying my ammo pouches has been ripped from my body, along with large portions
of my uniform.
Incredibly, a small first aid case I’d attached directly to my belt was still in place.
I could immediately tell most of my ribs were broken, and I remembered a medic once telling
me that that’s what they were there for- better a broken rib than ruptured organs.
My ankles were shattered, and I had a nasty protruding fracture on my lower right leg,
the white bone of my shin sticking out of my body at a peculiar angle.
A massive concussion, along with the gruesome sight of my broken body, nearly made me pass
out, but incredibly I was alive.
How long I’d stay that way was another question.
The firefight was still raging all around me.
The world hadn’t bothered to pause in its madness despite my falling out of a racing
helicopter and miraculously surviving.
I tried to treat my wounds using my first aid kit, but quickly found out my right arm
was hopelessly broken in at least two places.
I managed to wrap a bandage around my open fracture using my left arm, pure willpower
pushing me through the incredible pain.
Despite the raging firefight, I gave no thought to my safety- as far as I was concerned, I
just survived a fall out of a helicopter, God clearly had plans for me other than dying
in this patch of jungle hell.
To be more honest though, I just didn’t care.
The pain was so incredible, I was past a sense of self-preservation.
Whatever came next, I’d just let it come.
Not like there was much I could do about it.
I don’t know how long I lay there before I started to hear shouted voices nearing my
location.
I drew my combat knife, still strapped to my hip, with my only good arm and figured
if I went out, I’d at least show that there was some fight left in me.
As the voices neared though I realized they weren’t speaking Vietnamese, they were speaking
English!
It was difficult to make out what they were saying, my concussion was turning the world
into a blur of colors and sounds, but I began to yell back.
A hoarse whisper at first that sent waves of pain through my body as I forced my shattered
ribs to expand, but gradually growing stronger as I fought to suck in more air and make myself
heard.
I couldn’t even hear myself thanks to the dizzying blizzard of noise and images in my
head, but the soldiers somewhere out there in that darkness must have.
I heard the trample of footsteps and a whispered, “Oh my god, I think he’s alive!”, followed
by a call for a medic.
Strong hands began to lift me up, and I was surprised to find that I wasn’t feeling
much pain from all my broken bones moving at once.
I could hear more men through the darkening of my vision as I began to pass out, and the
sounds of very close gunfire.
Turns out my rescuers had been the same soldiers we had been flying in to rescue ourselves.
After getting tossed clear of my Huey, the pilot had tried to correct from the sudden
impact, but dipped too low.
Getting thrown out of the aircraft saved my life, as the Huey’s skids dipped into the
trees below and almost instantly flipped the chopper over.
Whoever wasn’t killed instantly by the massive inertial forces acting on their bodies, died
on- or shortly after- impact.
Incredibly, despite being under siege, the soldiers behind the wire quickly sent out
a rescue party, knowing that if any survivors were out there they’d be at the enemy’s
mercy.
Luckily for everyone involved, the Vietnamese had already started their withdrawal, knowing
that once the sun came up they’d be prey to American air power.
To this day I’m grateful to the eight men who risked their lives against a tidal wave
of enemy soldiers just to search for survivors in a hopeless situation.
Without their timely intervention I’d either have died of my wounds or at the hands of
a retreating Vietnamese soldier.
My injuries were severe enough that I’d be sent home permanently.
My body healed eventually, though the guilt over my being allowed to come back home while
the same men who saved my life fought and died in my place would never truly leave me.
Now go watch How I survived an actual military warzone, or click this other video instead!