April 27, 1971
We flew from CCK (Taiwan) up to Naha (Okinawa) where we picked up a
load of vegetables. We flew on to Qui Nhon (Vietnam), and
finally down to Tan Son Nhut (Vietnam) to begin our in-country
rotation.
When
we
landed at Naha Monday a master sergeant asked if he could ride
with us to Qui Nhon. After I read his orders and asked him
some questions I concluded there was about a 50-50 chance he was
away without leave--it was all rather fishy. But I figured
if he was AWOL it was still better that he return to his
station, so I took him.
April 29, 1971
Cheated
death
again--another
day
of
derring-do
in
the
war
zone.
Had
a
Vietnamese
pax mission and we got off late because of several small
problems. The VNAF ramp was a dog-and-pony show as usual
but we got off to Pleiku after shooing off one stowaway.
At Pleiku the radar controller gave us a really bad GCA
(ground-controlled approach). We landed OK, but if the weather
was worse we wouldn't have made it. I was concerned about
subsequent crews, so after we landed I phoned the GCA outfit to talk
about how much they misaligned us.
May 3, 1971
On flights around Vietnam our callsign was "Spare". This day
we were Spare 621 and we were scheduled for seven stops. For
something different we took a USO band to Danang by way of Hue and
Chu Lai.
There
were
two
girls
and
it
was
kinda
fun
to
have
them make the radio calls. They guys on the ground got
quite a charge out of it.
When we arrived at Danang, all the passengers got off but
one. I asked him where he was going and he said Chu
Lai! Seems he'd gotten on at Hue and for some reason
didn't get off while we were at Chu Lai! He checked with
Danang passenger service and learned it would be 14 hours before
the next flight to Chu Lai.
Our remaining stops were Qui Nhon, Tan Son Nhut, Chu Lai, and Tan
Son Nhut.
He
asked
if it'd be OK to ride along to Qui Nhon, TSN, then Chu Lai and I
said sure. When we arrived at TSN, Saigon Tea said, "Spare
621, you're fini." So here was this poor guy on the
opposite end of the country from where he wanted to be. Ah
well, there was a flight to Chu Lai at 7:30 AM.
