Bryan Pruitt


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Please list this photo under Bryan Pruitt

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ABCCC III Under Construction


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ABCCC III Under Construction

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sJABS knock out communication problems for warfighters

http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?storyID=3129194
JABS knock out communication problems for warfightersby Tech.
Sgt. Craig Lifton
332nd Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affair

12/22/2008 - JOINT BASE BALAD, Iraq (AFNS)—Joint Airborne Battle Staff members here are similar to 911 operators in the air as they ensure convoys operating throughout Iraq are never without communications.

JABS crews flying on board C-130 Hercules aircraft fill in the gap wherever ground communication is limited in the war zone, which is especially important on the dangerous Iraqi roads where improvised explosive devices, vehicle malfunctions and accidents threaten mission success.

“The Army needed an airborne communications platform,” said Capt. Seana Jones, the Multinational Corps-Iraq JABS Detachment commander. “We can be more mobile and can provide coverage in the communications gaps.”

The JABS was created to fill the Army’s need to keep in constant communications with convoys as they travel throughout Iraq. Ground communications stations dot the countryside, but due to distance, terrain, mechanical issues and atmospheric conditions, the ground systems can’t always provide 100 percent radio coverage.

“JABS is a crucial part of the convoy mission,” said Army Spc. Jamie Lipscomb, a movement control specialist with the 486th Movement Control Team from Kaiserslautern, Germany. “Without JABS, it would be virtually impossible to speak with the convoys.”

Soldiers, Sailors, Marines and Airmen make up the JABS crew. Coming from different bases and career fields, these servicemembers are joined to fulfill the JABS mission.
“I am learning about how the other branches work,” said Army Spc. David Jarvis, a signal support specialist deployed to JABS from the Army Garrison in Bamberg, Germany. “Everyone brings something different to the table.”

Operating on board a 777th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron C-130s, the JABS crew listens to convoy communications traffic. When ground communications are out, the convoying servicemembers can rest assured, knowing that JABS is overhead.

“Either we intercept the call and pass the information on, or they call us directly,” said Captain Jones, a New Smyrna Beach, Fla., native deployed from Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska. “We can call out a quick-response force, explosive ordnance disposal or aeromedical evacuation.”

Ensuring the servicemembers on the ground are ready for the fight is what JABS brings to the team.

“It’s essential to the guys on the ground,” said Navy Chief Petty Officer Dan Boyles, an avionics technician from the Expeditionary Combat Readiness Center at Naval Air Station Norfolk, Va. “JABS gives the warfighters on deck a warm, fuzzy feeling to know they can count on us.”

When JABS first started in March 2007, they had to start from scratch. They improvised and adapted to make the mission a success.

Resembling a police and fire emergency dispatch center in the air, the operating area—four chairs arranged around a sturdy and equally secured table with laptop computers on top—comes fully secured on a pallet, connected by cables to a second pallet with their communications equipment.

“We look out for all of the convoys,” said Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Nathan Humphreys, an operations specialist deployed to the MNC-I JABS Detachment from the Expeditionary Combat Readiness Center at Naval Station Norfolk, Va. “We know what can be potentially harmful and relay the information to them.”

“When JABS first started, they strapped down a card table and four folding chairs,” Captain Jones said. “Now, we use chairs from salvaged vehicles that are comfortable and can recline.”

The radio system, known as the Joint Airborne Communication System, or JACS, was large and difficult to move on and off the aircraft. The newest JACS weighs 80 pounds and fits in a box.

The 777th EAS aircrews said they are proud to be a part of the mission.

“We work seamlessly with the JABS crew,” said Capt. Kevin Eley an aircraft commander with the 777th EAS and native of Vienna, Va. He is deployed from Little Rock AFB, Ark. “We are one team, one fight.”

As convoys continue to roll out on to the roads of Iraq, JABS crews keep an open ear to their communications, ready to help at a moment’s notice.

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Compass Call reaches 10,000 Combat Hours

EC-130 squadron surpasses 10,000 combat hours

I know its not ABCCC but it is still an EC-130 and some of you may know some of them still flying.Regards,Bill HartAIT 74-78

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Got my cat!

Recently I was visiting the kids in Florida. While there my ex gave me my Alleycat figure she’d had in storage for years. Was in fine shape except for the tarnish on the brass plate. Was good to see after all these years—my Sawadee party was in May 1970.In some ways the figure looks amateurish - which gives it charm and what do they call it ‘patina’. I’m sure if I compared my ‘Cat’ with others they’d all be a bit different. Anyway it was good to be back in my possession and it now is proudly on display in my home in Ireland.

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Me over Bosnia 1994


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Please post this photo in aircrew section

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Aviano “95


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Avaino 1995 : Pilot Greg Piehl, TACP Andy Lierman , unk, unk, AIO Joe Kerr, unk, scan Gonzo, unk, BSOO Alex Barthe, unk FE dave Mitchel , DABS Robin Bagesse, Radio Steve Brown, Nav Buck Rogers, Co Dave Corby

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Fabrication Branch 3380th & 7ACCS

Been trying to get in touch with co-workers from Keesler days.  I worked in Aircraft Structural Maintenace from 1990-1991.  Would love to hear from anyone. 

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FE Gene Shinn has passed

I saw on another site that a former flight engineer, GENE SHINN, that had been assigned to the 7th ACCS had passed on after a fight with cancer on March 14th.  I thought some of you might like to know, someone might even has a picture of him in their picture gallery.

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Exercise Balikatan ‘08 tests ability to deliver

The USAF is flying exercises out of Clark Field again:http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?storyID3088737Exercise Balikatan ‘08 tests ability to deliverby Tech. Sgt. Shane A. CuomoAir Force News Agency3/4/2008 - CLARK FIELD, Philippines (AFPN) —Moving large amounts of equipment, personnel or humanitarian relief supplies can be a daunting task. But it’s a task tactical and strategic airlifters like the C-130 Hercules and the C-17 Globemaster III are made for. That’s why they were instrumental in Exercise Balikatan ‘08 held here[more at the link]

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New To Site/Have Pics

Hello all,I found this site quite by accident and recognize many of the names. I was the Capsule Maintenance NCOIC just after our deployment to Desert Storm. I had the profound duty of supervising the demilitarization of the ABCCCII and actually assisted loading one on a flatbed for shipment to somewhere in Virginia. I am still in posession of an original aluminum and rope ABCCCII escape ladder off the one I sent to Virginia. I also have some high res. photos of the ABCCCII capsule and as soon as I find them I will post them here. I hope this website is currently active and encourage emails from anyone that may remember me. I retired at Kirtland AFB in 1998 and currently work as a Manufacturing Engineer for Hitachi-Kokusai at the Intel Plant in Rio Rancho. More to come.............

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Battle Ax (Gun collection)

I remember the time I joined the 7ACCS softball team. I believe it was in 86. But we were one awesome team!

Our mentor “00 - Animal” was the catcher. And man did we have a team.

Smitty dubbed us his Gun collection, due to the players numbers and their ability to throw. We had a 44 (Baby Tuck - Left Center field) we had a 38 (Steve Hamill - 2nd Base) had a 45 (Prater Don - right center field) had a 22 (Ron Davis- short stop) 00 (Steve Smith - Catcher) Steve Ladd played first base. We had a few others but man this was the team.

We put out the challenge all over the base and the town of Biloxi. We even had a Radio Station take the challenge and show up in Limos with pretty uniforms. We took the field in rag tag outfits, but when the dust cleared we had sent them home packing.

Toward the middle of the season, fans starting singing the song “Another one bites the dust” as we took the field. Every tournament that we entered we won. Each time commanders call was held, we presented the “boss” with a trophy.

There was one tournament that we participated in where they had multiple award trophies. We took all except for Golden Glove. In that one, we even told the sponsors when we got there to go ahead and set the Winner trophy to the side and place 7ACCs on the plate!

Our group was a well tuned machine. And man could we hit!!! Just watching Baby Tuck smack those balls out of the part dead center and seeing them bounce off that office roof was awesome.

I would love to get back in touch with these guys, and maybe see what it would be like to take the field with some of them!

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Bill Gould: Crash Landing - Dec 67

Click for larger pictureA lot of the events from 1967 are fuzzy but the details of the crash are still very clear. As far as crashes go, this was not a really bad one. It could have been much, much worse.

I was an E5 sergeant flying the Intel seat on Cricket in December of 1967. I was one of six enlisted North Vietnamese speaking cryptolinguists loaned to 7th AF ABCCC from the Air Force Security Service (NSA) to help with manning until enough officers could be trained to fill the slots.

We had just completed a normal 10 hour mission in western Laos. It must have been about 1700 hours in Udorn. There was no indication of a problem until we touched down.

I remember that the rudder activity was a little wilder than usual. After a very few seconds it was apparent that we were going off the left side of the runway at a pretty high speed. The ride got progressively rougher, and we went airborne a few times before we slid to a halt. I am told that we took out a few small trucks during our uncontrolled landing, but I never actually saw them. The last hop into the air was a pretty high one that was caused by an earth berm in our path.

I remember as we were about to hit hard one of the senior officers said aloud “kiss your ### goodbye boys.” I remember that I was angry hearing that because I thought that we would not survive the next impact.

The impact was very hard, and included the crunch of metal and a few bangs. We came to a halt and adrenaline immediately kicked in. As I remember, the front end crew went out the ropes in the cockpit, and most of us went to the left rear door.

At first it would not open but after a few desperate pulls it finally opened. When it did, a burst of dust blew in and the abyss that we had to jump into was bright orange from the reflection of the burning fuel on the right side of the plane.

Number 4’s prop left its engine and pieces came through the capsule and hit one crewmember’s knee, as I remember.

The right side of the aircraft burned in a fireball as we jumped down to the ground. Without the customary stairs and with the tail slightly high it was a jump that one would not volunteer to make except under the conditions that existed. Luckily, fairly soft sand greeted our landing and the entire capsule crew made it out safely in a very few seconds.

My feet were moving when I hit the ground. At first we did not think that the front end crew made it out, but soon we spotted them about 100 yards in front of the aircraft.

Within about 45 seconds Pedro, the firefighting helicopter that always seemed to be in the air at Udorn was on top of our aircraft and emptying its round bomb of foam onto the aircraft to put out the fire. I sat watching the confusion for a few minutes, catching my breath. I walked a few hundred yards to the little RTAFB control tower and entered the store on the bottom floor where I commandeered a case of Sing Ha beer (I didn’t ask).

We drank a warm one while the emergency crews took care of the fire and secured the aircraft. As the Intel person onboard I was responsible for the classified leather briefcase filled with the codebooks and CACs. It took a while to secure them since they wouldn’t let us into the aircraft. Yet I knew that I couldn’t leave without the classified that I had signed out at the beginning of the mission.

I lived in a fancy bungalow in town with my five buddies from the Security Service. After debriefing and taking a cab home, my buddies asked me how the mission went. I told them that we ran off the runway and crashed and burned. And then I went to bed. Of course, they didn’t believe me.

I thank my lucky stars that I was flying in a wonderfully designed and built high wing EC130 that day. It really took a beating for us. It was pure luck that there were no flames in the exact spots where we exited the aircraft. I never really found out what happened to cause the crash other than hearing that the prop reversers might have malfunctioned. At any rate, the powers-that-were decided that our Cricket crew had to get right back on the horse, so we had our day off cancelled and we flew again the next day. The aircraft stayed in Udorn for months until they finally put it back together and flew it to CCK.

That’s what I remember about the crash 40 years later.

I’m not sure how many missions I flew but I believe I flew 1300 hours with Cricket which figures out to about 120 missions. I have lots of memories - some funny, and some not.

I have heard that 62-1791 still is flying and artifacts of the repair can be seen. I’d love to see her again. Does anyone know where she is and could a visit ever be arranged?

Bill Gould

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Airborne staff connects ground forces

Airborne staff connects ground forces

by Army Sgt. Alexandra Hemmerly-Brown 210th Mobile

Public Affairs Detachment

5/9/2007 - BALAD AIR BASE/LOGISTICS SUPPORT AREA ANACONDA, Iraq (AFNEWS)—Convoys going on patrols in Iraq can run into problems when they lose communication.

Communication is an integral factor in ensuring servicemembers’ safety while on the roads. It can be the difference between mission success and failure.

Unknown to many road-faring warriors, a lifeline is already in place, listening in on them from above.

“If we hear somebody who doesn’t know we are there, but keeps repeatedly calling a forward operating base that isn’t answering, we will answer,” said Maj. Dean Catalano, Joint Airborne Battle Staff detachment commander. “A lot of them don’t realize we are even up there.”

The Joint Airborne Battle Staff is a joint-service communications unit whose sole purpose is to listen in on convoys on the ground and to give assistance to those units when needed. They act as the go-between for convoys and the bases they need to reach.

[more at the link]

http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?storyID3052559

Regards,

Bill Hart

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Crew on Aircraft


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I was fortunate to get a good artist to put the aircraft I flew on down on a print for me. Thought I’d share it with you guys. After only 11 years of service I did rack up over 5000 hours flying time. I’m proud of that and all the folks I was lucky enough to crew with. John FloodBray, Co. Wicklow, Ireland

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Wrapped up the 60s with ABCCC


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After nearly a year with Batcat down in Korat I was transferred up to Udorn and joined ABCCC-Alleycat. Loved getting off those EC-121s (3 turning and 1 burning), but it always got me home.

Wasn’t long in Alleycat when Cecil Saul got me working in the orbit as the clerk. He was leaving and I got his job and still flying 7 or 8 times a month. Loved everything about it except typing flight orders - 4 copies, no smudges, all in line.

Lots of good fellows in Alleycat, enjoyed the orbit and the flying duties.

As an RTTY guy I hated those damn modems and KW-7 blocks. Too finicky. Lots of times getting in Blue Chip was hard. I remember the night Ho Chi Minh died - flash traffic after flash traffic warning everyone to be on their guard. The camaraderie was great and the pride everyone had in their work - especially the rivalry between the orbits.

Gosh I drank a lot when I was there. Amazing now to think that if you set aside 30 bucks or so - you could always go to the pool and have ten beers a night for a month and not break the bank. It was good times for a skinny little dude from Detroit.

In all I did 44 missions in seven months over 1969 and 1970. With Batcat included I got my hundred missions. I’m proud of that. On my ego wall sits a picture of me at the console and above that an ABCCC bird in flight.

After ABCCC I did tours with SAC ABNCP, CINCLANT ABNCP and NEACP. They tried to fix my bum ears a couple of times ultimately grounding me for good. So I left the USAF and went on to be a contract (ESI) for ten more years working on Airborne C3 systems. Even came down to Keesler one time to brief everyone on the KG-84 replacing the KW-7 - it was nice to see the old birds again.

Now I’m living in Ireland (home of my parents) running a corner shop and doing some writing. All in all, ABCCC is one of the touchstones of my life. It made a real impact on me and I’m proud to have served. Best wishes to all
----- John Flood, Alleycat 69-70

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Yoshee Preflight

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum�

There I was, a young Sra R/O in Moonbeam in 79. I was warned by Msgt Huskey to remember everything I was ever taught or I’d never get past my initial chk ride.. I was doing the best I could until at about 1045L that day.

I was told to get the crew van and pick up “Beamers” on the flt line side of the bld. as we were going to pre-flight Yoshee.

I get the van and while waiting for everyone I am looking all through my chk lists for the word Yoshee.

Panicking that I have no clue as to what a Yoshee is and can’t even find that word anywhere in my aircrew aids or chk lists the Beamers show up.

“Lets go”, I was told.

So I start driving out on to the Flt line when old Huskey starts in on me “ Airman do you know where the &*#~ you are going”? I had to humbly admit that I didn’t. We need to stop up at the club he told me. So there we went and there I learned that Yoshee was the bartenders name.

I also learned that day much to my dismay, the combat rules of running a dollar!

John Taggart

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I was robbed! Three times!

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum”

Remember how they briefed you upon arrival about not taking your restricted area badge, ID card or credit cards with you when you wandered into the night in Udorn Thani?

Well, one night, after flight and a typically long 15 or 16 hour work day, I decided to go deep into the heart of Udorn to the hotel I liked to frequent, for some monkey balls, raw cabbage (outside at monkey ball stand) and creamed corn soup and a large bottled coca-cola (inside at the hotel restaurant). All was well in mudville.

After I left the hotel by 5 Baht Samlar, I took a short tour of the various fun spots that Udorn Thani was famous and renown for...at least outside of Air America’s circle of dens of sin.

At one small hotel (the name eludes me, but it was all marble inside and the entrance was curved around the corner of a dirt street) I stopped to practice my Thai on a young lady that I must have confused with a language specialist, and proceeded to consume a few libations, some offered by my table guest.

The next waking moment I had was finding myself sans my clothes, except my shorts, in a dark room of the aforementioned hotel.

My socks, where I had usually, cleverly hidden my considerable valuables, (read restricted area badge, ID and Shell credit card) were mysteriously empty, my shoes (another genius hiding place) were also empty. In a vain attempt to regain my composure and therefore my identity and to determine the day and time, I quickly glanced to my left wrist...where I was sure I had left my Seiko Bell-matic and lo and behold..it too was missing.

Well, what the hell was a young Hillsboro weapons controller to do....Of course, I naturally proceeded into the long carpeted hall of the hotel, clad only in my boxers, and commenced to yell that I had been robbed. To whom I was yelling it wasn’t quite clear then, but in retrospect it did help to clear my foggy, mickied brain enough for it to dawn on me that being robbed was just the beginning of my problem.

For some reason the missing forbidden contents of my wallet became my greatest fear. What if some communist slug was to show up somewhere trying to get access to an AF restricted area and be caught with my badge? What if some yard boy was to get caught at the BX buying a refrigerator or air conditioner with my ID card? And God forbid...what if some Thai yahoo was to run up a fortune on my Shell credit card?

I was definitely in a world of sh--, and all because I was just trying to practice my Thai.

My next sortie into the underworld of the SEA conflict was a daytime raid into Udorn Thani armed with my super 8 camera and a Minolta reflex still camera.

There I was, a typical nondescript American GI, almost undetectable in my blue jeans, tee shirt and sneakers. I set about recording all the sights and sounds of the Udorn streets, hotels, Monkey House, race track, train station, klongs and of course the market and theater.

Late that evening, having documented for my children all the wonders of Udorn and its environs, I was just stepping onto a Baht bus back to the base and had removed my wallet to pay the driver for my ride home. While standing in the door well, wallet in hand, out of the corner of my right eye, I saw this blur of a figure as he leaped onto the bottom step of the open doorway. Quite to my surprise..he filtched my wallet clean out of my hand and in a second blur of speed departed the same bottom step of the open doorway.

For a millisecond, I inventoried my wallet in my mind’s eye. 2000 Baht, 20 US dollars, pictures, and damn it to hell...my new restricted area badge, and new ID card, but, thank God...no shell credit card..(I never replaced the last one).

Well, I quickly assessed the situation and jumped off the departing Baht bus in full chase after this dastardly, communist, restricted area badge filtching, ID card thief! About 500 meters into the chase with camera bags and cameras flopping around, crushing my hip and smashing my ribs, I witnessed a man actually run on top of water as my thieving dirtbag traversed a huge klong like he had webbed feet.

Since I was neither equipped nor trained in over or under water pursuit I decided to yell at the top of my lungs.. “Come back here you communist bastard!” Somehow this verbal order from an American Airman, who was there to save them from the nighmare all around them, was disregarded.

For the second time, I was in a world of sh-- and all because I was just trying to pay my way home.

My third incident of being relieved of my valuables occurred at 23,000 ft. There I was, soaring above the surly bonds of earth, headset on, listening to the sounds of war...when comm comes up on private intercom. “Slow Ops you got a call from Sergeant Webb back at Udorn”. Well, what the heck would Jack be calling about...an emergency back home, promotion, maybe they found my ID card?

I came up on the radio patch to the squadron and the first words I heard were “Hey Dave, we’ve been robbed!” Within the blink of an eye, I retrieved my wallet from my flight suit and confirmed my ID card was still there, I also had my badge and I no longer had any credit cards, so for some reason, I was calm.

“Who, what, where, how did it happen?” I asked. To this day, I have never heard anything as funny as what SSgt Walter E. (Jack) Webb then said to me. “I was gassed” he replied. I started to laugh, not too sure of what he had said, but it sounded so funny...I said “Gassed? What do you mean..gassed?”

He replied “I was asleep in the hootch, (in this case he was talking about a bungalow we shared downtown) and they got into my bedroom and gassed me before I could react. All I saw was faint shadows as they went about the room and robbed me of everything I had”.

“But you said “WE’VE been robbed"”, I said. “What do you mean WE” He said “Well, evidently after they left me semi-conscious in my room they went about the house and burglarized your room and the kitchen, living room and even the clothes the house girl had drying on the clothes line. They even got my motorcycle that I had chained to a post in the living room” he said.

By this time, I had stopped laughing. “Did they get my cameras?” I said. “Yup.” Was the reply. “My film canisters, albums?” “Yup.” “My clothes?” I said weakly. “Roger that. They even got my Chevas!” he said, dejectedly.

“But, wait a second, what happened to the shotgun carrying Thai guard we employed in the compound?” I asked. “Can’t be found.” He replied. “And the german shepherd dog the owner had in the compound?” I asked. “Poisoned!” he said, flatly.

At least I wasn’t there, I thought as I registered robbery number three and I won’t have to give some lame excuse to the commander about the loss of another restricted area badge and ID.

Moral of this story? Pay attention to FNG briefings and don’t leave a guy with a Dragnet name in charge of your sh--. Gassed… my a--.

Dave Butson
Hillsboro ‘72-’73

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‘Me, Ken Bortz, the burn barrel… and the gasoline.

So there we were… headed to the burn barrel again, for the umpteenth time toting those 8 or 10 big long brown bags of classified waste that needed to be destroyed.

Some of them were from flights that had been stuffed into the bottom drawer of the orbit safe, some of them newly generated that day by the Moonbeam crew on duty today prepping for another crew’s mission that night.

Wed done this a thousand times before and it wasn’t the chore that we’d have picked to do, had it been solely up to us. Bortz was the TTY guy and I was the lowly Intel Tech on duty that day.

We were on the same Moonbeam flight so burning always seemed to fall to us… or so it seemed…

But this day was different.

As we trudged through the compound toward the burn barrel down by the fence we noticed that Papasan was cutting grass that day… and what did we see sitting there at the door of the maintenance shed? You bet… we spotted a can of gasoline.

One of us scrambled for an empty Coke bottle and poured it about half-full… maybe 4 ounces, of gasoline.

Off to the burn barrel we went, with a new plan. We were excited with the possibilities… we were pumped.

Now the mechanics of the burn barrel should be explained for those of you who were not TTY or Intel (No… I’m not bitter...) It was a large wire mesh cylinder about 4 or 5 feet long and a good 4 or five feet diameter. It had a hinged hatch that was maybe 14 or 18 inches square that was unlatched and opened in order to put your waste to be burned inside the barrel.

The whole barrel then rested on a frame and had a handle on one end that was used to rotate the barrel as stuff burned inside. The faster you rotated the handle, the more white smoke was generated from the burn… but that’s an altogether different war story. I’ll post that one sooner or later.

So back to the story…

Sure enough… Ken and I stuffed all of the bags into the barrel all at once, which was normally not the case. On normal burns we’d rip two or three bags open and loosely stuff their contents into the barrel and then periodically, after that portion had burned sufficiently, we’d add more bags as time went on and after an hour or so, all the classified waste would be gone.

But this time, it was all or nothing!

All 8 or 10 of those bags went into the barrel, onto which we sprinkled the gasoline.

We stepped back and threw a lit piece of wadded paper into the open hatch and Voila! all that waste was toast in less than 10 minutes. It was gone… It was history… and a new procedure had been born.

We spent maybe 10 days giggling at the other Orbit crews at the burn barr… laboring over what could have been such an easy task… If they knew what Ken and I knew.

Eventually it was our turn to burn again. We didn’t hesitate. We didn’t whine. We gladly accepted the task and headed out of the Orbit, burn bags in tow. We also had Captain Abbot in tow. For some reason, that day he wanted to hang with us. We were happy with that. He was OK. He’d soon see how damn smart a couple of NCOs can be…

As Ken and the Captain toted the goods through the ABCCC compound toward the burn barrel, I headed off to see if I could snag the key to the maintenance shed, large Coke bottle in hand.

Sure enough, I got the key from the First Sgt Office offering some bogus excuse about needing to look for something or putting something away.

In the shed I found the gasoline… and Intel Wienies being Intel Wienies, I’m thinking “If a little gas was good last time, then a lot more would be better this time.”

I filled that Coke bottle all the way to the top.

We all met at the burn barrel and Ken was stuffing everything he could into that damn thing.

The Captain probably had reservations, but he didn’t voice them. He knew the routine… If we stuffed all that waste into the barrel at once, we’d be there all day. He’d been on burn detail many times before and he knew how it went.

“Stand back and behold our powers Captain.”

Burn barrel stuffed to the gills, one of us emptied the contents of that tall Coke bottle onto the contents as the other one turned the barrel. We just kept turning that barrel slowly to allow the gasoline to permeate every cranny and fold of that classified waste.

After 30 or 40 seconds of slowly turning the barr… maybe as long as a minute, the time of truth had arrived.

“Watch this Captain and behold the knowledge and skills of the Enlisted Man.”

Bortz flicked the Bic to life and I held the one piece of balled up waste over the flame to get it going.

Once lit, I tossed the burning ball of paper into the open hatch of the burn barrel, expecting to get a fire going quickly so we could then quickly close and lock the hatch like last time and be done with things in no time…

Instead - you guessed it. KA-WHHHOOOSSSHHH!!!!

It looked like a Hollywood napalm hit…

The burn barrel belched out a rather large fireball as it exploded, throwing itself 2 or 3 feet into the air. Screen wire from its sides flying lose and classified waste flying hi… Scores… no hundreds of pieces of classified waste, some wadded up, most not, flew skyward, into the wind.

Some papers were stuck up against the 10 or 12 ft flightline fence but you know it… more that a few blew over the fence and were lazily headed toward the runway… far from us being able to retrieve…

The three of us scrambled around, collecting all that we could… all the time watching several valuable secrets slowly drifting across the run-up area of the Udorn runway toward who know where…

We ended up burning the remaining waste in a pile, there beside the destroyed burn barrel until it was all gone. We lost a few, we got our asses chewed… Capt Abbott getting most of the grief and he was just along for the ride…

I always felt bad for old Capt Abbott… Tom was always getting blind-sided by some 0-5 or 0-6… and deserved most of them I’m sure… But not this one. This one was our fault.

Well… as it turned out, everyone in the squadron had to start using the Base burn barrel way down on the base, adjacent to the runway. CEs wouldn’t repair or replace the ABCCC burn barrel. Burn detail was transformed from 45 to 60 minutes of irritation to a 2 hour ordeal of pain… and that was if you could find a spare truck to borrow to go do it.

Sorry all you guys who ended up having to use the base burn barrel after Bortz and I destroyed the squadron barrel… But you know what? I think I actually remember telling Ken Bortz way back then “Don’t sweat it. This’ll make a good war story someday...”

And it did.

Gene Hilsheimer

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Tee-Lock

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum”

Origial Post:
Mbuffo1 - Posted: 09-Apr-03 15:29
Told to me as the truth:
Early 1969, a full colonel rotated back to the States. He was so loved by the men in his orbit that they took up a collection, went to his live-in (Tee-Lock)(sp?), gave her traveling money, money for a passport, a one-way PanAm ticket, and his address in the States. Said that he had sent for her.
It pays to take care of the troops!

Replies:
cobra935o - Posted: 11-Apr-03 11:48
Hopefully he didnt have a wife already in the states, wonder if she ever made it to the states and how they worked out?

Vaughn Drinkwater - Posted: 22-Apr-03 17:29
As I recall, There was a certain Col. that rotated back to the states, divorced his wife and lived happily"ever after” with his tee-lock. He had made arangements for her to follow him, money, pasport, visa, ect, ect. I also recall that there was a great age difference. I wonder how long it lasted??

Jim Stanitz - Posted: 17-Jan-05 20:08
I was at Udorn in 1968 when I first heard this story. That version:
A colonel at one of the bases in the middle of Thailand (Takhli, Korat, Ubon - I no longer remember which) was true-lovin’ his Thai secretary, promising to marry her. Come DEROS, he bugged out, leaving her behind, pregnant. Since he was so beloved (NOT) by his troops, and since she was genuinely liked by everyone, they took up a collection and bought her a ticket to the States, and gave her his address. Yes, he was already married back in CONUS. So endeth the story from 1968.
A year or two later, Playboy had a one panel black and white cartoon in the back of the magazine, with an obviously American woman answering the front door, and a very pregnant obviously Oriental woman outside. The caption read: “I don’t understand. What do you mean, ‘If Papa-san no come Mama-san, Mama-san come Papa-san’?”
I guess this is one of those stories that’s like the Ever-ready bunny: it just keeps going and going and going and . . . . . I’ll bet a version of this story went the rounds of the Army Air Corps in France in World War I.
And, yes, it definitely does pay to take care of the troops! 

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Dramamine

OK… This war story was generated from reading a post from another section of this forum… Somebody mentioned puking… so here it is… And I swear “This Ain’t No Shiat”

Being the Intel Wienie, it was my responsibility to carry the first aid kit along with all the other junk we carried for the rest of the battlestaff.

Inside this little olive drab canvas bag was an assortment of this and that… band aids, gauze, tape, aspirin, etc. that a battlestaff might need. Also in there was a bottle of Dramamine… in case anyone got nauseous from the sometimes bumpy rides. I don’t recall anyone ever using it up to that point… but it was there.

Well, I’d been flying for about a year or so… This had to have happened sometime in late 1970. I was maybe 22 and an E-4… One night, soon after our aircraft had been outfitted with Igloo White relay equipment, the bumpy ride was a lot more serious than earlier in my ABCCC career. This was because prior to our aircraft hauling Igloo White relay equipment, we could pretty much buzz wherever we wanted to in the night skies over Laos.

It used to be “If it’s rough over here… let’s fly over there… but those rules no longer applied. Because we were now carrying Igloo White relay equipment which relayed commands to and responses from acoustic and seismic sensors seeded all over the trails in Laos, it was necessary for the ABCCC aircraft to pretty much fly in prescribed locations so the relay equipment would work properly.

Well, this one night is was like flying through a washing machine. It was hour after hour after hour of turbulent toil as we went about the business of ABCCC. The longer it went, the more everyone was getting worn out in one way or another.

I recall about 6 or 7 hours into this roller coaster ride of a mission, I slowly came to the conclusion that I was starting to become nauseated. I fought it for quite a while but as my mouth started watering much more than normal, I just knew that the conclusion of this condition was fast approaching and I’d better do something about it.

I reached down and picked up the first aid kit and poked through it until I found the Dramamine. I took one and then made one of the most stupid decisions of my ABCCC career… I offered others in the battlestaff the opportunity to join me.

I forgot that I had been crewing with Fighter Pilots, old grizzled NCOs, macho-men from all walks of life and all of much higher rank. The laughing, pointing, jeering and calls of “#####! Wimp! F@%!ing Intel Wienie seemed to last for some 15 minutes. It was brutal and I’m sure deservedly so…

I was so embarrassed that I just sunk back into my Station 7 chair and tried to disappear… “Why did I do such a stupid thing? “I could have just popped the Dramamine quietly and not shown myself for the ##### that I apparently am… “I am such a dork… This’ll get around the entire squadron… “I’ll never live this down…

Well… we continued to bump, and grind, and shudder, and shake. Up and down… Down and up… it just kept on and on and on… But you know what? About an hour or so past my public flogging, I was nauseous no more… I was doing OK, despite the terribly bumpy ride. I was doing OK and the sting of the public ridicule was subsiding.

So things are going quite well, when all of a sudden Capt Jim “Buddah White EXPLODED out of the High Controller seat - Station 4. When I say EXPLODED - I mean EXPLODED. He leapt up and was in an immediate dead run toward the back of the capsule. He didn’t even have time to rip his headset off of his head. That happened for him as he reached Station 5 when he ran out of headset cord.

Well… I guess old Jim made it to about mid-Station 6, headset still in mid-air, when a veritable eruption of barf propelled itself from his mouth toward the back of the capsule… Jim, still in a dead run, mind you…

And that did it… Jim White’s unsuccessful sprint to the capsule head was the trigger that EVERYONE in the Battlestaff was waiting for to induce their own voluminous eruptions of air sickness. Everyone but me that is… From Radio Operator to DABS to BSOO to TTY to AIO to all positions… barf was flying everywhere!!!

And there I sat… the #####, the Wimp, the Intel Wienie… right as rain and even better once I pulled the Emergency Oxygen bottle from beside my seat and masked up…

I went through my bottle and the bottles from two other stations before we got home that morning…

Sitting there… sucking emergency oxygen… watching the entire rest of the battlestaff continue to run operations while gagging, mopping, blotting, soaking, and otherwise living a miserable, wet, stinky existence for the rest of the time we were airborne.

It was all pretty gross and I feel worst for the capsule maint crews that were tasked to get things back to normal in that box after we came home… but ya’ know what? Nobody called me a wimp or a ##### after that flight. It was sooooo cool…

Gene Hilsheimer

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A memorable trip to the Holiday Inn Bath House

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum”

Actually - they all were memorable…

After a big Squadron Sawadee Party late one evening, a bunch of us ended up down at the Holiday Inn bath house in Udorn…

Probably 5 or 6 of us…

Capt Doug Hawley, Moonbeam Intel, was there… as was Maj Gov Karki, Squadron Intel…

Major Karki was of Indian or Pakastani decent and out of uniform, he could pass for just about any businessman in downtown Udorn.

So into the bath house we went…

Of course, I opted for good old Number 19… and Doug and Guv and the rest went their own separate ways…

An hour or so later… I’m bailing and I see Doug Hawley settling up as well.

Doug is all dressed but he’s carrying another set of clothes with him.

I asked him what the deal was and he told me he had figured out that Major Karki was in the cubicle next to him…

Knowing that, Doug stood up on the “massage table” on his side of the cubicle and peeked over.

He saw Karki’s clothes hanging on a hook within easy reach so he quietly lifted Guv’s pants and shirt over the cubicle wall and left with them… (Guv’s wallet was still in the trousers)

Doug and I went our separate ways after leaving the Holiday Inn and I watched as Doug got into a taxi with Major Karki’s clothes and off he went…

I heard that Major Karki ended up at the main gate of Udorn several hours later… waaayyy after midnight, in black lowquarter shoes, black socks and a pooying’s sarong wrapped around him… trying to convince the gate guard that he was a fighting American military man… not some local Pakistani trying to sneak on the base…

I guess Guv had to sign his life away to get out of that bath house without paying up front and kudos to him for talking them out of a sarong and cab fare…

Doug hung Guv’s clothes on the doorknob of his room in the BOQ so he did eventually get them back.

I don’t know if Guv ever found out that it was Doug that did that to him… so here it is… in the open now…

Gene Hilsheimer

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Near Mid-Air - 1972

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum”

It was in April 1972 as I recall when Moonbeam was diverted to fly an orbit over Vietnam instead of our normal orbit near Savannakhet.

It was unusual but something had broken somewhere and TFA at NKP needed us there because of the sensor relay equipment we carried and the fact the the North Vietnamese Army had just crossed the DMZ a while back.

Well… because we were in a different orbit than usual, there was “more to see” out of the cockpit windows.

Ken Bortz (TTY) and I were up in the cockpit early on during that mission. I was on headset, he was not. He was standing behind the pilot, looking out the port cockpit window and I was to Ken’s right… He had the better view that I did.

We had been there about 15 or 20 minutes, watching actual fighting going on on the ground… we could see explosions from Air Support as well as ground to ground tracers… it was something different and something interesting…

About that time Bortz spotted flashing aircraft lights off at about 9:00 o’clock headed toward us. He pointed them out to me and because he wasn’t on headset and I was - I advised the pilot.

The lights were maybe 30 seconds away and headed toward us… and because we had our lights on, the pilot didn’t see a need to make a radio call as the lights appeared to be below our flight level… but not by much.

We watched and watched as the flashing lights came closer and closer and the aircraft, some sort of fighter, passed right below us by maybe 100 feet or so. We could all see his cockpit instruments glowing as he went underneath.

Just as the jet was out from under us, a call from the back end came through the headsets asking Bortz to return to the capsule, as a TTY message was coming in.

I relayed that info to Ken and back to the capsule he went.

A few seconds after Ken left the cockpit, there ensured a conversation that went somethin like this -

“Peacock, Gunsmoke. (Not the actual fighter callsign)

“Go ahead Gunsmoke”

“Who do you have out here at 210 for 90 at angels 24?”

“Gunsmoke, Peacock - that’s Moonbeam”

“Well Peacock, can you tell him to turn his f-ing lights on, I almost ran into him” (Our light were on all the time)

Our pilot stepped in with something like - “Gunsmoke - Moonbeam… we had you all the way… you passed right under us… no sweat”

“Moonbeam Gunsmoke, I didn’t pass under you. I had to pull up hard to avoid you”

So the conversation on the intercom went something like this:

“Stupid fighter jocks… they just don’t have a clue… they don’t know up from down… hahaha… blah, blah, blah...”

We all laughed about how wrong the guy was and how fighter pilots were dorks and all that… and we bid the Gunsmoke guy adeau and left it at that.

Some 15 or 20 minutes later, Ken Bortz returned to the flight deck and this time he was on headset…

After a while on headset, he said something like “Man, did you see those two aircraft that came so close to us a while back?”

We all looked at Ken and someone said “Two????”

Ken replied “Yeah… two. One went right under us and the other went right over our back...”

Man, you should have seen the blood drain from the faces of that ABCCC aircrew…

Of course, Bortz had his normal face on… that look of bewilderment that we all loved…

Gene Hilsheimer

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Dennis Plymale and the steering lock caper…

This Entry Was Transfered from our Legacy Site’s “War Stories Forum”

Posted: 14-Feb-03 17:05

The 7ACCS moved lock, stock, and barrel from Udorn RTAFB to Korat RTAFB in April, 1972.

When we got to Korat, the squadron compound was way down near the back gate. The street that it was on was long and straight down at that end of the base…

Normal Ops for us guys driving the Bread Trucks or the Orbit’s Chevy Pickup was to get up to around 45-50 mph when headed back to the squadron.

About 200 yards before the squadron entrance, we’d put the truck into neutral, turn off the ignition and put the keys into a flight suit pocket and coast the rest of the way to the compound…

Once coasting, when we’d get to the left turn into the squadron area (through the gate in the chain link fence around the compound) we’d gently brake, make the left turn, roll into the parking area, wheel the vehicle into its slot and there we were… ready to bail right away.

This worked great until the AF, in its infinite wisdom decided to replace our Chevy Pickup with a Datsun Pickup…

Well… way back then, nobody had ever heard about or even seen a steering lock… That included Dennis Plymale… Moonbeam Radio Operator.

So one day, up on the base Dennis headed with this wonderfully bright and shiny, not to mention SMALL pickup truck… I think he went up to the message center.

True to form, on the way back to the squadron, Dennis had that little truck up to about 50 mph when he put it in neutral, turned the ignition off and stuffed the key into his flightsuit pocket.

Everything went just fine while he was going straight and level… then came that turn into the compound…

Yep… you got it. Halfway through the lefthander the steering lock kicked in and off the pavement and into and through the chain link he went… (more like into and under...)

Dennis spent days afterwards working that truck… trying to get out of the dog house… but no matter how much he buffed, waxed, polished, kneaded, and worked that baby… you could still see the fence marks on the hood and top of the cab of that pretty little vehicle…

Steering Locks… what’s up with that??? All of us other ABCCC drivers were just glad that Dennis was the one to “teach” the rest of us about those pesky little things.

Gene Hilsheimer

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Circles in the Sky

Ray Roddy has completed his masterpiece.

Circles in the Sky - The Secret War in Southeast Asia - A Command and Control Perspective

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