ken_arnold_1919 's Home Page

Lt. Chuyen Van Nguyen 518th Fighter Squadron V.N.A.F.

Chuyen Van Nguyen was born in Con Thoi village, Kim Son district, Ninh Binh province, North Vietnam in 1949. His parents were poor farmers, orphaned before the ages of 4. They started out with nothing but were determined to send their children to school. They could not read and write and did not know a lot about what was going in the world but sensed there must be something better for their children. With the partition of Vietnam in 1954 they became part of a refugee program called Passage to Freedom that relocated almost 800,000 people from the North to the South. Chuyen would become a member of what was at the time the 4th largest air force in the world.

What can you tell me about your family's relocation from North to South Vietnam?

Chuyen: " I escaped to the South with my parents and 3 other siblings in 1954, after the country was divided in two parts by the Geneva Convention. I was five at the time of the relocation. In the Vietnamese language, it was called Di Cu Vao Nam, meaning Resettlement to the South. What drove out my parents from the land they loved dearly was the fear for their lives. They fought against communist insurgents from their Catholic parish for a long time. There were atrocities on both sides. I was flown to the South by a USAF's C-47 (DC-3, Dakota)

My family is Catholic. After Ho Chi Minh declared Independence in Hanoi on September 2, 1945, my father told me that the Catholics were very nervous because of the ongoing animosity between them (the communists considered the Vietnamese Catholics as French collaborators) and the Vietnamese Catholics had to organize to defend themselves. My father was an armed defender in his parish under the command of the pastor and under the ultimate command of Bishop Le Huu Tu of the Phat Diem Diocese. Yes, that was the main reason why we had to move.

Ninh Binh is a very beautiful province situated by the sea and is the concentration for many Vietnamese Catholic villages and dioceses. The photograph of the Phat Diem Cathedral is a very famous landmark not just amongst the Catholics, but a spectacular architecture with the building technology used by a Catholic Deacon (later ordained pastor of the same cathedral) to build such a giant church in rural Vietnam with so many solid boulders, without any known transportation and lifting means in the late 19th century. To the Catholics, Phat Diem it is a spiritual shrine that each of them wishes to visit at least once in their lifetime.

[ Note - Ninh Binh is located south of the Northern Delta, between the Red and Ma Rivers. The population is made up of 23 ethnic communities, among which the Kinh account for more than 98%.

The old city of Ninh Binh is one of many famous historic sites in Vietnam. Other sites in this area include Hoa Lu Citadel, Nhat Tu Pagoda, and Can Linh Pagoda. From Hanoi to Ninh Binh province is 93 km on National Highway 1. The province is endowed with picturesque scenery. - ]

Where and how did you live?

Chuyen: "We lived in Long Dinh village, a refugee camp set up by the government of President Ngo Dinh Diem, in the Mekong Delta area, seven miles West of My Tho province, about two miles North of the Fourth National Highway. There, my family first resettled with about two hundred other North Vietnamese Catholic families. Life was very normal according to my very narrow point of view and knowledge. The children of course were happy and innocent, but the adults were worry of how to make a living without resources and without land to cultivate. Everybody was poor equally and living in a village surrounded by a large river on one side and vast rice paddies that belong to South Vietnamese on the other. Back then, South Vietnamese did not like us ..."Bac Ky, the Northerners" as we were slurred as) living on their land and always made fun of our Northern Vietnamese accents. My family had 11 children, 2 died at birth. There are 9 of us. I was the only one who served in the military, others were too young.

In the first couple of years things were fine. We, as small children, played with tree branches, beer and soft drink caps, wadding in the rice paddies, rivers, tending water buffalos, and ducks, etc...

There were no hobbies or time off for children my age in the village. After school and after homework, we all had to help with the family's work for our living, either in the field or weaving straw mats in exchange for food on the table, even though most families did not have a table for eating. My family ate off a straw mat on the dirt floor. Meals usually included plain steamed rice, vegetables that grew wild in the back swamp and whatever shrimp or fish we could catch from the waters.

My Elementary School was in the Long Dinh refugee camp, with the same name, taught by the some of the people living in the camp and the Catholic pastor. We were all so poor and innocent. Taking a photograph was so expensive and my family could not afford many of them. I have the only one photo of my life in Long Dinh It was the day our class graduated. I notice none of the students in the whole class had any shoes on our feet.

Being devout Catholics and eagerly serving their church, my parents sent me to a Don Bosco Missionary seminary, the Salesien in Thu Duc just East of Saigon after I graduated from the Elementary School in 1960.

There, I studied Latin and French for almost 3 years. I got kicked out for repeatedly talking back to the foreign missionary priests and brothers. And I didn't think the priesthood was for me.

What became of your parents and where did you finally move once you left the refugee camp?

Chuyen: "Our family survived the poor life in the Long Dinh refugee camp until 1962. Communist guerrillas constantly attacked the camp even after we built the protective periphery that was called Tactical Hamlet. Dirt berms, guard towers and bamboo traps around the village failed to prevent many attacks days and nights. My parents packed up and moved to another refugee camp North East of Saigon, Gia Kiem, in the province of Long Khanh. My family stayed there to the end. The communist government changed the name of the province to Dong Nai after their victory in 1975.

I continued my Primary High School in Gia Kiem, Long Khanh until it ran out of classes for me to go to. To the dismay of my parents for losing a farmhand and no money to cover my studying expenses, I decided to move to Saigon to continue with my schoolings. I promised my parents that they would not have to worry about the tuition and living expenses. I only beg them to afford the loss of me as a farmhand. They agreed and I struggled to find work in a primitive society to support myself. I graduated First Baccalaureate and Second Baccalaureate (French Education System) in Vietnamese Literature and Foreign Languages from Truong Son Secondary High School in Saigon.

What was dating like for young Vietnamese?

Chuyen: "When I was growing up, dating was considered as a sinful act and those who dated must go to church for confession. Any contacts between boys and girls would triggered a rumors mill in the village and causing embarrassment to the parents. The best place for dating when I was growing up was either at a school or a church function. Boys and girls would exchange timid conversations and secret looks. There is nowhere to be together alone for a boy and a girl who are not married to each other.

I met my wife not through the conventional way. My mother and the older sister of my future wife arranged the meeting for me. Her older sister (Mrs. Thin, her name) married to my next door neighbor, Lt. Hong Huy Dang, from the village. Hong was the VNAF cargo co-pilot that I once mentioned. He graduated the T-28 Class of 71-08 at Keesler AFB, MS, and went on to learn flying the C-123 Fairchild. Hong was stationed at TSN AFB. After 13 days of marriage, his plane got shot down at the DMZ while dropping supplies for the VN Marines. The plane broke in halves and fell into the Cua Viet River and none survived. The next day, people found the bodies of the pilot, two cargo sergeants, a flying mechanic, but not Hong's. Mrs. Thin stayed and faithfully served the family of her husband in my village. My mother observed the good deed and thought it would be excellent if I could marry someone from Mrs. Thin's family. Sure enough, Mrs. Thin told my mom she has several younger sisters and at that time, my wife, Ngoc-Thuy Thi Nguyen, was the oldest at 17 years of age.

As pre-arranged, I showed up in full military pilot gear (The law made all servicemen and women to wear uniforms all the time) and met my wife's family at her home in Saigon. My parents in law are also North Vietnamese Catholic refugees from 1954. But since they can read and write, they chose to stay in Saigon and away from refugee camps and made a fortune opening a store and worked as a custom made tailor. Her parents are also from Phat Diem area. As the matter of fact, they were married inside the Phat Diem Cathedral in 1951.

The photo above was taken on the 4th floor of my wife's home after our wedding party on April 27, 1974.,

My father in law did not like me. He did not even talked to me, only said "Hi" and "Bye". He was afraid of military uniforms.. He forbade my future wife to go forward with me. He told her: "Hong was a cargo pilot and he last 13 days. Chuyen is an attack pilot, how many days is he going to last? My house is not a storage area for widows! Go find a civilian and marry him"!

My wife protested and was in defiance of her father's order. She even threatened to leave the house. In the mean time, I went back to the squadron, did not say anything to my mom and had never gotten in touch with the family of my wife again for about six months. I kind of agreed with her dad, I did not know what the future was for me, if I would live or die and I did not want to have an additional person to cry over my dead body.

In Vietnam at that time, marrying to a soldier was the norm, especially to a heroic US trained attack pilot. The parents might look at marriage as a security protection for their children, but youngsters would like to marry somebody that they could be proud to show off to their friends. My wife's family had money and my wife did not want to marry me for the money. Besides, I did not have any money. (I already used all the money I had saved from 18 months training in America to build a beautiful home for my parents and siblings in my village of Gia Kiem).

My father in law finally gave in to his daughter's demand. Mrs. Thin in the village told my mother of the situation and my mother was very upset at me for not continue visiting my future wife's family. My mother kept telling me, since I am the oldest son, she wanted to make sure she had a grandchild to carry the family's name, in case something happens to me. My mom and Mrs. Thin arranged everything afterward and made an appointment to have the two of us and the two families together again for an engagement party. The rest is history. After the wedding, my father in law still wouldn't talk to me until the day we escaped the country.

This is the photo taken with the best men and best ladies at the lobby of the Le Lai Hotel Restaurant just before the wedding party.

What made you want to fly and had you ever been in a plane prior to your military training?

Chuyen: "Flying to me was regarded highly as in any human being. When I was a kid, looking up at a high flying heavy machine in the air was something I could not understand. Being able to fly was an untouchable dream for me. I'd never thought of one day I would be the person who controls a flying object, let alone performing patriotic duties with it in the sky.

I remember vaguely that I was flown to the South by a USAF's C-47 (DC-3, Dakota) as a tiny 5 years old refugee during the Resettlement to the South. The second time I was flown by the VNAF's C-130 jampacked like tuna in 1970 from Tan Son Nhut AFB to Nha Trang AFB to join the VNAF training program, after I graduated from the Army Officer Training Course in Thu Duc.

The third time I hitched hike a ride on a USAF's C-7 Caribou from An Khe, Qui Nhon to Cam Ranh Bay, then Nha Trang AFB. While waiting for the order to go to the US, I went AWOL by bus from Nha Trang to visit a relative living in An Khe, Qui Nhon. On the way back, my aunt who worked as a cashier on the base's PX asked her GI supervisor if he would arrange to have me fly back to Nha Trang, instead of having to ride the bus on the very dangerous stretch of Highway 19.

My flight instructor, Major James M. Ingalls, pinned the USAF pilot wings on my suit lapel.Major Ingalls was a very "tough" instructor. He was the "I" Flight Commander and only had to teach one student. I was his sole student in "I" Flight. All other instructors had 2 students.

Above is the graduation night photo of my class, the 72-05, at Keesler AFB on Tuesday January 11, 1972. I was standing in the back, 11th from the Left. Kneeling in the middle was Colonel Robert G. Liotta, the USAF 3389th Pilot Training School Commander

How did you make into what had to be a very exclusive selection process for pilot training without influence of people in the military or government?

Chuyen: " The reason that I became a pilot, I happened to be at the right place at the right time when the selection occurred.

In the years of my Secondary High School in Saigon, I had to work as a house maid and a babysitter during the day and as a tutor at night to feed myself and earn enough money for school tuition. I left my village of Gia Kiem in 1964 because it did not have any higher classes than the Primary High School classes that I had already graduated from. One year before I was drafted, I landed a job as a messenger with USAID, the US Agency for International Development, in Saigon. I sorted and delivered mail inside the agency's 11-story building, 100 yards away from the Secondary High School where I was going to at night. Sometimes I had to deliver mail to the US Embassy and other US agencies around Saigon as well. At USAID, I learned and honed my American English language.

Scenes from Thu Duc. The Catholic church, Mary's grotto and the central market in the 1970's. Thu Duc on the web Thu Duc on the web

Chuyen: "In December. 1969, I was drafted into the Vietnamese Army. In mid 1970, when I was at the Thu Duc Army Officer Training School, several representatives from the VNAF showed up as prearranged one day, while our class of 1,500 was meeting in a hall.

My rare photos from the Army Officer Training School.

Lunch in the field included plain rice, fried fish with all the guts intact, tea water mixed with salt as dipping sauce. I was at the 4th position with serial number 68 on the helmet. Quang Trung VN Army Training School. I was kneeling on the right. From what I heard, all three guys standing in the back were lost in the war. The guy on my right, Truc, was captured and jailed for 6 years after the war was over and is now in the US.

I remember they told us something to the effect that they had lost too many pilots in Laos, Cambodia and in the battlefields within South Vietnam and could not recruit people fast enough. The question was if any of us Army guys had the talent, the skills, and the guts to try out and join the Air Force. I volunteered and passed every challenge with flying colors, including the English language test. Amongst the 150 who volunteered, I was the first man who departed for the US for the pilot training program on January 14, 1971. The course lasted 18 months. Not very many youths from my village became an Air Force pilot, especially an A-1 Skyraider pilot.

As the matter of fact, I was the one and only. There was a C-123 cargo pilot, but he got shot down and killed at the DMZ area while dropping supplies for the Vietnamese Marines in the famous Hot Summer Invasion of 1972.

I did not have anybody in the high places to be blessed from. Our family did not know anybody in either the military nor in the civilian government that could exercise any influence on my behalf. I remember having to pay a neighbor sergeant, a very low ranking sergeant, for him to sign a security document assuring that I would return to Vietnam after training and would not go AWOL (Absent Without Leave) in the US. After serving 5.5 years I ended with the rank of Second Lieutenant, which tells some truth to my statement. Some of those who got drafted in the same time with me made it to First Lieutenant, Captain or even Major.

Where in the USA did you train and on what types?

VNAF version of the T-41 This is my original portrait for all official documents during the war.

Chuyen: " I first qualified on a USAF's T-41 (a civilian version of Cessna 172) at Randolph AFB, in San Antonio, Texas. I then, qualified and got my USAF's wings on my T-28 (Trojans) A and B Models at Keesler AFB, in Biloxi, Mississippi. I went on to learn with the A-1 Skyraider at Hurlburt Field #9, Eglin AFB, in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. I flew the A-1 to the end of the war.

Photo of T-28 A & B over Kessler AFB Mississippi.

"I" Flight, Class 72-05, at Keesler AFB, MS. I was standing, 2nd from Left, with 2nd white name tag indicating the Flight Leader position.

On the time off between missions, there was not much entertainment. There was a volleyball court in front of the squadron offices. There was a soccer field and a tennis court near by, but playing Chinese chess and cards were the most popular games. I lost my monthly salary on those games all the time. I know, I was a bad boy and my wife had to ..."rescue" me often. The relationship between my superiors and me was normal. Since we were a fighter squadron and faced death everyday, senior pilots treated us in very friendly way and were informal. I was the lowest ranking and youngest pilot in the squadron and was not in a position to struggle for power with anybody, so I felt I was treated fairly and with respect.

Chuyen: "The Skyraider served the purposes well with the guerrilla war in Vietnam, comparing to all aircrafts that the US gave to the VNAF. Even though it was not a sophisticated one, it could carry a very heavy load, it could stay in the air for a long time and because of the slow speed and low altitude, it was impressively accurate.

Did you have your own personal aircraft and did you have any special markings on it. Mission markings like bombs, Your wife's names etc?

Chuyen: " No I did not. By the time I started flying, the A-1 fleet had been quite old and spare parts had became scarce. From what I could see, the VNAF had to salvage spare parts from damaged aircrafts to maintain the ones that could still fly. I did not notice anybody who had any individual markings on the planes. I think the tail letters that started with letter "K" belongs to our Squadron, the 518.

Each time when I was called for a mission, the Tactical Command Wing would assign a plane for me from a pool of them, whichever one that was flyable and fully loaded for the intended mission.

[Note : The South Vietnamese Air Force 518th Fighter Squadron flew the Douglas A-1H "Skyraider" under the command of the 83rd VNAF Special Operations Group and was considered to be the elite squadron of the VNAF. ]

The NVA by that time had a lot of towed AAA and tank mounted radar tracked vehicles did they not? Was there any one AAA weapon that was the subject of more discussion? Did they have the shoulder fired missiles at that time?

[ Note: The NVA and even the Viet Cong could field some heavy anti aircraft fire. U.S. forces were often amazed at the heavy weaponry the other side managed to bring through jungle with no roads. At 250-500 feet massed AK-47 fire or an RPG fired in your path can still do a lot of damage.]

Chuyen: "Being hit by antiaircraft was the norm in our missions, but the VNAF's maintenance crew did a very good job with their sheet metal skills to patch up the holes.

We encountered a lot of the NVA's AAA at every mission and there were many of them at each target. There were 57mm, 37mm, 23 mm, 7.62mm and SAM's. They all focused on me at different altitudes hoping to get me. All I could do was pray and "rolling hot" (enter the target). Sometimes, I considered fighting the war as a ..."game". I tried to beat them and they tried to beat me and sometimes, someone had to lose, including Soviet made tanks. The NVA introduced a lot of tanks into the South, especially up North by the DMZ. One pilot from our squadron, Capt. Tran The Vinh, destroyed 21 of them before he was shot down and killed in the famous Red Hot Summer of 1972. When you come to a target, tanks would be the prime target to destroy because they could do a lot of damage to you and eventually the ground troops.

I would attack them with whatever ordinance I had on the plane: 20mm cannon or even spent rocket pods. The VNAF tried their best to load Skyraiders with ordinance that fit the need in battlefield, but more often than not, things didn't jive and we had to make our best effort to assist the ground troops.

The best technique to cut down a tank is to hit it on the side, knock out the chain, flip it over.

...

[ Note: The NVA fielded the T-72 tank and the Soviet made shoulder fired AA missile. A forerunner to the American Stinger supplied to the NVA. Tough on helicopters and low flying slow aircraft like the Skyraider. ]

Chuyen: "The NVA had utilized many shoulder fired missiles and downed many VNAF's planes with them. Our A-1 Skyraiders were pretty vulnerable. Luckily, they were soon modified and fitted with burning flares that we could pop out to confuse those SAM's which was named SA-7. As a matter of fact, the A-1 Skyraiders were more afraid of the smaller AAA, the 7.62mm, because we flew low and slow and the 7.62mm could really penetrate and explode on our sides. The bottom section of A-1 Skyraider has a thick steel plate to protect the pilot and its gas tank.

In close air support missions, VNAF pilots had to be very accurate or ground troops and innocent civilians would be errornously killed. In many cases, the friend and foe were only feet apart and we had to bring napalm down to separate them. Rockets, cluster bombs were more difficult to control, but napalm was not since we had to fly in at tree top level to maximize the effect of the congealed fuel. We disregarded our own safety trying to save the ground troops and those who were threatened with death from the enemy.

This is me before a mission with 6 Napalms.

My worst mission was one I flew as a wingman for Major Ninh Van Nguyen (no relation to me). After a mission to relieve pressure on a famous trouble spot by the name of Binh Gia on Highway 1, Out of the 8 MK-82 bombs (500 pounder), Ninh had one stuck on his right wing that would not fall. Ninh contacted the Tactical Ground Control and was granted the permission to get rid of it at the Free Striking Zone, a small area located next to the section of Dong Nai River about 50 miles Northeast of Bien Hoa AFB.

We went to the zone with I followed far away in a tactical formation, not a regular tight one. I held on up high and after many passes and regardless of what Ninh did, the bomb would not separate from his plane. Ninh again, after instructed to turn off all safety switches to the bomb, got the permission from the ground to land with it, against safety rules.

We were directed by the Bien Hoa AFB control tower to descend to the normal one thousand feet altitude and told us to use the downwind leg of the traffic pattern (just before the final approach) from the North side where there were just rice paddies. The South side of Bien Hoa AFB was the heart of the city with very dense population. I continued to be on the tactical formation, following far behind and a little below Ninh's plane. As we about to turn into the final approach, I watched in horror as the bomb fell off Ninh's plane. I hollered loud on the communcation system and to my observation, I assured everybody that the bomb would fall into the rice paddies below.

PEDRO at Bien Hoa AFB

I broke away from the formation as instructed by Ninh and to my horror, I saw a ball of fire and my plane shook violently as the bomb exploded amongst a small group of about three thatched roof huts. They soon caught on fire. Luckily, there was a USAF's rescue helicopter stationed permanently at the Bien Hoa AFB tower with the code name Pedro that immediately took off and came to the scene to coordinate the rescue effort.

As soon as we landed, before filling out the Special Accident Report, Ninh and I went to the hospital on base to visit the many wounded victims. Many of them in serious condition. Two months later, Major Ninh Van Nguyen was shot down and killed at the Duc Hoa, Duc Hue area, in the Mekong Delta.

[ 518 Squadron Sky Raiders in flight. A-1Es of the 518th FS carried codes like KWA and KWC, with the smaller K and larger W being the squadron identifier and the smaller A and C being the aircraft identifiers.]

I wish we had laser guided ordinance. Skyraider pilots did everything by using a primitive sight gun and our own eyes and feelings. We did not contact ground troops directly but through a VNAF's FAC (Forward Air Controller) who launched their own smoke rockets to pinpoint the targets and made corrections from their own smoke spots.

I did not get any additional training after got back to Vietnam except some navigation technique to qualify for being a 2-ship flight leader two years later. Once back to Vietnam, VNAF pilots like myself were put on the right seat of the A-1E Skyraider model (a 2-seater) for a mission or two to see what's out there and then we would be on our own as a wing man on 2-ship missions behind a little more experience flight leader.

T28 Trainer

What were you told about possible capture? What did you expect to happen if you were shot down?

Chuyen: " VNAF pilots were equipped with a small Smith & Wesson revolver for protection. In my survival vest, besides a flare gun, a compass, a strobe light and an emergency radio, I had packed a small and powerful hand grenade for use, just in case. In the heat of the battle, captured VNAF pilots usually were tortured and killed by the most horrible ways. US pilots would be treated more fairly because they could be used as a good bargain chip with America. There wasn't much of a bargain chip for a VNAF pilot.

VNAF's A-1 pilots flew many SAR missions and many other types of mission. If we happened to be on the spot of a rescuing effort, we would perform the fire suppression task for helicopters and ground troops to rescue downed flyers. Otherwise, we were at the total dispose of the commanders.

There was an A-1 pilot who was on a training mission happened to be very close to a site of a battlefield where communist forces were overruning a ground troop position. Without any major ordinance, he offered to come by the target and use his 20mm cannon. After finished with his 800 rounds, he was shot down and captured and jailed with US flyers in North Vietnam. Amazingly, he was later released in 1973.

What was your most memorable mission or worst mission and why does it stick out from the others?

Chuyen: "My most memorable mission was a night mission sometime in 1974. I was supposed to help relieving pressure from communist forces on a VN Rangers outpost at Tong Le Chan, near An Loc, North Northwest of Saigon, by the Cambodian border. It was a very dark night, around 11PM, when the call was in from the Tactical Operation Wing for the mission

There were four Skyraiders with 10 MK-81 (250 pound) bombs each, scrambling onto the runway at Bien Hoa AFB, a two-plane flight from Squadron 514 next door, and another two-plane flight from our Squadron, the 518. Captain Nghia Van Nguyen (again, no relation to me) was my leader. As we were en route to the target, we were told by the Tactical Operation Wing to hold position because the VNAF's C-47 plane that drops flares to illuminate the target was having mechanical difficulties on the ground of Tan Son Nhut AFB. Capt. Nghia made an agreement with the other Skyraider flight that we would be holding at five thousand feet, and they would be holding at a higher altitude in the same general area, on top of Phuoc Vinh District, waiting for the C-47 cargo plane to come up. This is to prevent a collision that might happen in the dark.

We were flying in circle for a long time because the C-47 seemed to have a more serious problem than first thought. It was cold in the cockpit and I was hungry. I did not have a good dinner in the evening. I was broke from playing cards and could only afford an inexpensive piece of French bread sandwich with some cold meat and a plastic bag of ice tea. It was quiet, besides the boring even sound of the engine from the front of the plane. I could not remember how many rounds did we make in the dark before I felt asleep and lost direction, even with my eyes wide open.

The aviation term for the sickness was "vertigo". The flesh hairs inside my ears got messed up and I lost the sense of direction. I did not know exactly what happened, but based on the evidence and guessing afterward from the incident, I think this is what happened.

I was on a tactical (a loose and far) formation behind Capt. Nghia's plane when I saw his plane started to dive. I called on the radio and asked what was he doing, he said he was doing nothing, just level flying, and waiting for the order to go to the target. I adjusted my position in relation to Capt. Nghia's plane and again, I saw his plane went diving down. I yelled on the radio and asked what he was doing again. He once again said he was doing nothing, just level flying. Seconds later, in the darkness of the night, I vaguely remember seeing the position lights and the rotating beacon light on Capt. Nghia's plane dived deeply and broke away from me very fast. As I yelled for Capt. Nghia to take good control of his plane, he yelled back, saying that I, not him, might be falling into the vertigo status. I apparently pulled on the control stick harder and harder out of fear and ascended high away from my leader's plane.

I completely lost sight of Capt. Nghia's plane. I called and asked for his position, he said he is still level flying at the location where he was with me a couple seconds ago. I was terrified at the feeling of being in a vertigo. My eyes were open but I could not recognize anything around me anymore. The more I was afraid, the more I pulled on the control stick to the point that the plane could not climb any higher and started stalling. I could feel the control stick shaking violently and according to what I had studied, the wings of the plane lost all the lift and the plane was about to go into a spin.

My mind was clear but my eyes were still asleep and I still couldn't see very clearly. I vaguely remember seeing the altimeter showing something like eight thousand feet. It means I had inadvertently climbed three thousand feet in the dark and in the disoriented status. From what I learned in flight school, when a Skyraider is fully loaded on the wings and gets into a diving spin, the centrifugal force would be so great that the wings would break off as the plane is spinning. Historically, nobody had ever could stop or recover from that kind of a spin. A bold thought popped on my mind and I decided to eject. I knew I was flying above an area full of enemies, but I had to take a chance, rather than stay in the plane and be killed for sure. On the intercom, I could hear the scared voice of Capt. Nghia, kept calling me to wake up from the vertigo.

I called on the radio: "Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, Dragon 202 (my call sign that night) vertigo, eject!, then hooked both hands into the yellow "D-Ring" on the front of the seat and with all the strength, yanked it. I heard a big bang around me, the canopy blew up and flew away. The rocket of the "Yankee" ejection seat behind me stood up straight and fired. I felt the intense heat on my back for a second or two, then the seat with the parachute underneath unfolded and the rocket pulled me to a standing position and out of the plane. The wind hit me so hard in the face and I immediately snapped out of the vertigo.

As I realized what was happening, I was even more terrified because the rocket failed to pull me away from the plane. It disconnected from my shoulder harnesses prematurely soon after pulling my upper body halfway out of the cockpit. My legs were caught onto the backrest frame of the seat by the seat belt and my upper body was outside of the plane. The wind whipped me back as I fought trying frantically to crawl back to the control stick. I held onto the backrest frame of the seat with one hand, the other hand used to cover my mouth. I heard pilots could get killed by the wind blowing up their stomach in such cases like this.

I fought and fought with the wind. I felt so helpless as the plane full of bombs fell from the sky without anybody at the controls. I was prepared to die. I thought of my father, my mother, my sisters and brothers and said good bye to each and everyone of them. I knew in just a moment, I will be blown into pieces with the bombs and burnt to ashes by the fuel of the plane. I closed my eyes and counted "one, two, three, I die now. Good bye everybody. I love you all"!

Suddenly, I told myself, I should not die this way, I have to live. I have to fight and get back to the cockpit. I again started to fight the wind, utilizing the seat belt, my legs, my feet and my hand on the backrest of the seat, I gained inch by inch and after many minutes that I thought like forever, I finally got back into the seat and grabbed the control stick. By that time, the plane had leveled itself off, without going into a spin. The technical reason was after free falling for so many thousand feet, the wings of the plane picked up the speed and lift again and got out of the stall by itself. Had there been someone inside the cockpit to fight the stall, the spin would have happened and would never have stopped.

I looked at the altimeter and it showed seven hundred feet. My plane almost hit the ground and it fell freely for more than seven thousand feet with me dangling outside the cockpit. My heart was pounding as I disconnected the parachute harnesses because I was afraid the somewhat opened parachute might pull me out again since the canopy of the plane was gone. I descended to tree tops level and aimed toward Bien Hoa AFB. I did not dare to eject the bombs under the wings because I wouldn't want innocent people getting hurt on the ground.

I reconnected the radio cord. I wanted to let everybody know that I am still alive and I was coming home. I was crying loud out of happiness, but could not contact anybody. (I later found out that when the canopy exploded, it knocked off the broadcast antenna from the plane, but not the receiving one). I still could hear the terrified voice of Capt. Nghia calling "the whole world" for help and asking the other Skyraider flight to look for a small fire on the ground, assuming that my plane would hit the ground and burn after I ejected.

As I approached Bien Hoa AFB, I made a very low pass in front of the control tower, rocking my wings back and forth, signaling a radio problem. When I turned around, I received a batch of green flares shot from the tower, signaling the permission to land and I put the plane on the runnway with all 10 MK-81 bombs intact. As I taxiing by, the control tower looked at my tail ID and called Capt. Nghia and told him that I had returned to Bien Hoa and landed safely.

By the time I pulled the wounded plane to a parking spot in front of the Tactical Operation Wing building, there were dozens of VNAF personnel, including Lt. Colonel Vinh Quan Nguyen, my Squadron Commander, an ambulance, waiting for me. Everybody heard the whole incident on the radio system. As I climbed out of the cockpit, everybody cheered and celebrated. I yelled something to the effect of blaming the parachute technician for his work, but my Squadron Commander told me to cool down and told me everybody loved to see me home alive. He took me around the plane, showing the horrible wounds on its body.

Before being taken away to the hospital for a general check up, I fell into the arms of Lt. Colonel Vinh and cried like I had never been allowed to cry before.

[ Note: The official pilots manual ejection procedure for the A1 specifically states. "Do not delay extraction below 2,000 feet AGL if futile attempts to start the engine or for other reasons that may commit you to an unsafe condition. Accident statistics emphatically show a progressive decrease in successful ejections/extractions as altitude decrease below 2,000 feet AGL. "

Considering the altitude they operated at, this note in the pilots manual must have been discouraging at best. Data courtesy Skyraider.org

SOME MEMBERS OF THE VNAF 518 FLIGHT SQUADRON
Standing from left are: Lt. Luom V. Pham, Maj. Lanh N. Nguyen, Lt. Khien V. Tran, Capt. Chin V. Nguyen, Maj. Tung V. Nguyen and Lt. Ba V. Nguyen.
Kneeling from left are Lt. Chuyen V. Nguyen, Capt. Long V. Le, Lt. Col. (Squadron Commander) Vinh Q. Nguyen, Maj. Hai V. Nguyen, Lt. Xuan M. Pham, Lt. Be V. Le.

Lt. Chuyen kneeling last on the left.

FINAL MISSION

How did the war end for you?

Chuyen: "The final days was horrifying not just for my wife and the kids, but for myself as well since we did not have any bomb shelters at the temporary shelter we were staying in. A wooden table could not have protected us from shredding into pieces had we been hit by a shell. Tan Son Nhat AFB was shelled continuously from 4AM to 9AM with 130mm cannon. There were a lot of destruction from burning planes, burning buildings and many deaths. We rushed by many fires, rocket craters with whizzing shells overhead to escape.

For myself, I did not know South Vietnam was falling. We were scrambling to fly the many missions trying to save the ground troops. I was ordered to evacuate from Bien Hoa to TSN AFB (Saigon) on April 24. My flight leader, First Lt. Loc Huu Pham, crashed on take-off on the taxi way. (The runway was jammed pack and there was no room there for take-off). Loc ejected, the ejection seat (Yankee Seat) exploded but failed to shoot him out. I flew to TSN by myself and amazingly, Loc survived the crash, paid for a ride on a Honda motorcycle to TSN and join me that evening.

There was no clear communication from commanders to the rank and file of the pending collapsed of the country. I never knew and thought Saigon and South Vietnam were ever going to fall. In many cases, lower ranking personnel were abandoned by their commanders to fend off for themselves.

I served with only one Squadron, which was the 518, from the beginning to the end. None of my flying records nor log books survived when we evacuated to Tan Son Nhut AFB from Bien Hoa AFB, one week before the whole thing collapsed. After I already evacuated to Tan Son Nhut and communist troops were about to enter Bien Hoa, my wife, Ngoc-Thuy T. Nguyen, single handedly went back to our room at the BOQ to retrieve many irreplaceable photographs of ours.

In the three years of flying (from 6/72 to 4/75), I usually was scheduled to fly 2 days and had 1 day off. The days I worked, I usually flew two missions during the day and one at night. Sometimes I flew more missions, but that was not the norm.

My major missions were closed-air-support when our troops and the enemy were very close. Most my missions were in South Vietnam, therefore, there were no Migs nor Helicopters from the North Vietnamese to worry about, even after the American left in 1973.

Our squadron lost only one pilot on April 29, 1975. He was Major Phung Truong. My last mission was on the morning of April 29, 1975. We were trying to stop the advancing communist troops that were flowing to Saigon from the Northwest (where they had their headquarters and strongholds that they won over in the summer of 1972).

I was a Second Lieutenant. My wife and I, a 5 year old brother and a 2 month old son along with a group of other attack pilots and their wives escaped to the US Naval Base Utapao in Thailand on a SVN's C-119 cargo plane at around 11:AM on April 29. On that plane was my best friend Second Lieutenant Duc Van Dinh.

Chuyen: "My best friend was Second Lieutenant Duc Van Dinh. He was from my T-28 Class of 72-05 at Keesler AFB, MS. He was from my same A-1 Class of 72-01 at Hurlburt Field, FL. We came back to Vietnam together and because of the North Vietnamese origin and religion, him and I were roommates at the BOQ (Bachelor Officer Quarter) in Bien Hoa AFB.

At the Huntington Beach Pier. Photo taken on a 1983 trip when Duc and his family visited California. From left are Chuyen, NgocThuy, Ha (Duc's wife) and Duc Van Dinh

We escaped on the same VNAF's C-119 cargo plane and after I resettled in Arlington, I urged his family to move from Wichita Falls to be my next door neighbor. He died in 1993 from a gunshot wound he received from the robbery at the convenience store he owned in Forth Worth, Texas.

Once in Thailand. What was the process to come to the USA...were you in a refugee camp for a long time or with your language skills, background and education was the transition made a bit easier?

Chuyen: "Any Vietnamese who made it out of Vietnam at that period of time was eligible to come to America.

We stayed at Utapao US Naval Base for 2 days, gave up all weapons, military clothing, then flown to USAF's Anderson AFB in Guam for another 2 days. On May 5, 1975 we were flown to El Toro MCAS and trucked to the USMC Camp Pendleton. At Camp Pendleton, we were processed from a Vietnamese military officer into a US civilian political refugee: given civilian clothing, given a Social Security number and everyone was given a sponsor.

My family stayed at Camp Pendleton for 5 weeks. On Friday, June 13, 1975, we were flown on American Airlines to DFW (Dallas-Fort Worth) Airport and meet our American sponsors, Tom and Emma Pitre, and settled down with their family in Arlington, Texas.

With the language skills I had, things went relatively smooth for my family and me. Besides our sponsors, we met a lot of nice people from the St. Matthew Catholic Church. As I was told, in response to the pleadings from the Diocese, the parishioners formed a group to sponsor and help us refugees. There were seven Vietnamese refugee families brought to Arlington, a city of one hundred twenty thousand residents then, in the very first wave of refugees.

How has life been in the last 25 years? What career path did you have?

Chuyen: "It has been wonderful. Our family has been blessed with an excellent sponsor and the American people have treated us well. I married in Vietnam on April 29, 1974. We have 2 sons, the older one, 28 years old, is writing for the Seattle Times and the younger one is 26 and will graduate from Hastings College of Law, in San Francisco.

My family, Duc's family and our sponsors' families in July 1975. Duc's sponsor drove Duc's family from Wichita Falls Texas to Arlington, Texas. to visit mine and my sponsor's families.

We first settled down in Arlington, Texas. I did not have any plan or a career path. When I first came to the US, the minimum wage was $2.10 an hour. Even though I made a little more than that, it was still too expensive to fly and I did not convert my USAF Flying License to a civilian one. My focus was providing for a wife and two little boys in a strange land without any money or relatives. My first job was a carpenters helper for three months. My second job was a mechanic shop helper for two years. My third job was a tire serviceman, a back breaking and all weather job for one and an half years. Imagine an Oriental guy at 5'4" and 110lbs wrestling all day with 18 wheelers and earth mover (yellow, giant) construction equipment, working between 15 to 16 hours a day at airport and highway construction sites. That was me, trying to provide for one wife and three small boys.

I got into working for the government because after moving from Texas, I started to get involve in community volunteered works, helping new refugees, boat people to resettle. I sometimes got involved in the work of lobbying with various level of elected officials to save the war buddies left behind being held in camps in Vietnam. I did the volunteer work while making a living as a Production Supervisor for a company that makes sophisticated windshields and canopies for aircraft.

In the 1998 election, I ran for Mayor of the city of, where the Vietnamese town of Little Saigon is located, and lost. But my community's activities and that candidacy caught the attention of the Senator representing this area, including Little Saigon, and he asked me to join his staff, full time.

My job is to represent the senator at many community functions. Inside the office, I use the position of the office to help constituents to resolve difficulties with government agencies, especially state level agencies.

America has been good for me and my family, just like she has been good for other refugees who came before us looking for protection from persecution, and death. We are grateful for it and I am proud to be a naturalized American.

Like many former South Vietnamese families who served in the military, Chuyens is scattered about the world.

Chuyen: " My younger brother, a seminarian escaped by boat to the Philippines in 1980 after several attempts and jail times. He is now pastor of a large Catholic Parish of the Diocese of Orange here in Southern California. My younger sister, younger and immediately after the brother above in the family, escaped with her husband and two daughters and were picked up by a French merchant boat in the high seas and brought to France since 1985. My father passed away in 1996 in Gia Kiem, Long Khanh. My mother and everybody else immigrated to the US in 2000 through the official process, safely by plane.

A Few Links & Credits

Photo of 518 sq aircraft over the Mekong Letters KM courtesy MSgt. George T. Curtis. POPASMOKE USMC Helicopter Assoc.

VNAF WEB SITE Excellent resource on a little written about subject. Photo of Lt Nugyen & Squadron member's courtesy Leon Wohlert via Robert Mikesh's "Flying Dragons - The South Vietnamese Air Force and Mr. Nghia T. Ta

SKY RAIDER.0rg Great site. Source of many technical facts on the plane and procedures. Source of diagram and 1971 Pilots manual used by training aircrews

VNAF FLYING CLUB WEB SITE Source of VNAF INSIGNIA AND 518 SQDRN Aircraft Photo.

A1D SKYRAIDER WEB SITE

A 1 Skyraider Model of the 518th by Triet Cam a copy of his fathers plane and Squadron insignia.

A very real looking model of a A1 ( see link above)

Link to a former 518 Aircraft under restoration in the USA

VNAF CADET WEBSITE

E-Mail Me @ worldwar2mem@yahoo.com

BACK TO THE MAIN WWII MEMORIES HOME PAGE

This page hosted by

Get your own Free Home Page