RING of FIRE
“SCRAMBLE
TO HELL”
By Hank Howard, MSGt, USAF (ret)
(TSgt Hank Howard)
Nineteen
Sixty-six found me assigned to Tan Son Nhut AB, RVN
as an (ABR) Airborne Rescueman/
Firefighter on HH43B and
HH-43F helicopters. TSN was acknowledged as the busiest airport in the world at
that time and rightly so as it was in midst of major transition period for the Vietnam
War. For this airfield to
exceed all major airports in the states or world was quite noteworthy. During
1966 I personally participated in over 200 scrambles for in-flight emergencies
and on/off base crashes that left a significant impression on my memory till
this day.
One
of the most indelible lasting ones involved a
(A1C Ken Kaufman)
Listening
to the VNAF Control Tower Operator, we overheard him tell the C-47 with a right
engine out to do a right turn and cleared him to land. The (AC) Aircraft Commander Capt. Stu
Purviance and (CP) Copilot Capt. John 
Symmonds yelled out together “That’s dumb and Oh Shit”!
I
was kneeling on the front side door seat and watched in horror as the C-47 went
into a fatal angular descent toward an off base area. We turned and followed
the plane down as it plummeted to the ground and exploded right in front of us.
In a matter of seconds we were at the crash scene, off base about two miles, in
an unsecured area that was home to the “Bad Guys”. The Gooney Bird was ablaze,
smashed to smithereens, and had no visible survivors. We did a quick 360 around
the crash site and then deployed the Fire Suppression Kit. The plane crashed
into a dry rice paddy and our FSK
was spotted nicely behind the dike. The rescue party of three got out. We were
unarmed and in our silver turnouts, with no SAR radios or portables to talk to
the aircraft. Deploying the hose, we extinguished what fire we could. The (MT) SSgt. Jerry Steif made a
360 degree preliminary search around the crash site and quickly reported no
survivors by indicating with “Thumbs Down Sign.
The HH-43-B then with lights on flew above the crash
area doing some search patterns. I was quite surprised about the lights since
we were off base and in “The Badlands” open to anything. We still had no backup
and no Gunship support.
All
of sudden within the perimeter of the crash site I noticed Vietnamese dressed
in black pajamas picking up debris from around the crash scene. They were
grabbing avionics, radios and anything that they could make off with. At this
point, we were very vulnerable and in a hostile environment without any
protection. The “Pucker Factor” was rising.
I called Ken and Jerry to get together and we removed our silver coats
and hoods and crouched down below a patty dike.
Then, to our surprise the chopper that delivered us to
the crash site flew off. The area was now ringed with over 100 people who came
from nowhere to see what they could scrounge. Our “Puckers” were
maxing out!
We stayed down along the dike and hoped someone would show up to secure the area.
We
were on the ground about 15 minutes when the HH-43B came back, this time with
another FSK.
We
deployed the second kit and the chopper went into an orbit around the crash
site perimeter. Ken Kaufmann and I returned to our full turnouts and darkened
down the remaining fire but could not fully extinguish it. About that time an AC-130 Gun ship and C-47 Candlestick
Flare ship were orbiting overhead and kicking out a huge assortment of flares.
I remember a couple of flares with parachutes landing close to us.
Finally,
we had UH-1 Gun ships flying low orbits around the crash area and flying right
over us. Capt. Purviance made a decision to leave the
empty Fire Suppression Kits on the ground and we three were picked up and
returned to the DET14 Alert Pad. There was a third FSK in reserve and we stood
Alert for the rest of the night.
Throughout
the war, there were many instances where Flight Medics and Airborne
Rescueman/Firefighters were exposed to dangers, some benign, like this incident, others more
deadly.
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