Hugh Mills - Low Level Hell

Not again, I thought. Pony One Six had just made what I considered a bad tactical mistake for a scout pilot in combat. To pull an immediate right three sixty before his OH-6 was out of the line of sight of the enemy ground troops would bring the Pony Loach right back over the same track in which the enemy contact had been initially made. I silently hoped that it wouldn’t cost him.

Then Hayes talked to his pilot again. “Lieutenant,” he said, “I’ve got a red smoke ready to drop, but you’re too far off to the side of the contact point. Come around… come around again.”

Even though the Darkhorse scout pilots had told him many times to never—never EVER—come back into an enemy contact point the same way, in a predictable flight pattern, Pony One Six immediately hauled another hard right 360-degree turn. Again, right over the watching enemy’s head.

As I bent forward intently listening—but unable to do a damned thing to help—I heard Hayes scream back at his pilot, “No, Lieutenant, break left… break left. LEFT , sir!”

Pony One Six apparently then jerked a hard left to get the ship over the contact point and allow Hayes to throw the smoke. But the smoke still wasn’t where Hayes wanted it, and Pony pulled another hard left turn—making the third time he had brought the ship in from northwest to southeast right in the enemy’s clear line of sight. That’s all Charlie needed. The enemy immediately sent up a barrage of AK-47 fire that pounded into the little OH-6.

To his horror, Hayes suddenly saw Pony stiffen in his cockpit seat, slam his head back into the bulkhead that separated the pilot from his crew chief, then slump forward in his seat, dropping his hands from the plane’s controls. The next thing Hayes remembered was awakening in the wrecked ship on the ground, with excruciating pain in his leg… and the almost deafening quiet of the jungle.

Without even hearing Pony One Six’s gunship call back to ops control for a full troop scramble, the siren screamed and we all ran for our ships again. Helping another downed scout was our highest response priority.

Scout Bob Calloway (One Zero) happened to be working another VR near the spot where Pony One Six and Hayes had gone down. One Zero was vectored in to put an immediate cap over the crash scene until the rest of the troop could mount up and fly to the site. What Calloway saw when he arrived over the crash was Red Hayes sitting on the ground near the wrecked plane attempting to ease an obvious leg wound and cradling the limp body of his pilot across his lap.

When the Loach crashed, it had hit the trees, fallen to the ground, and nosed over, leaving the helicopter upside down. When Hayes regained consciousness, he realized that his knee and ankle were seriously hurt, but he succeeded in cutting Pony’s seat belt and shoulder harness so he could get the pilot out of the ship in case of fire.

As Calloway circled over the wreck, he realized that Hayes did not have a survival radio and could not talk from the ground. But it was obvious that the crew chief and pilot were hurt. Minutes later, the ARPs were put down on a nearby road and moved over to the wreck site. They secured the area, determined that Pony One Six was KIA, and executed the evacuation of the downed crew.

Pony One Six’s ship had taken an AK-47 armor-piercing round up through the cockpit floor. The projectile entered the pilot’s left thigh, tore through the femoral artery, and traversed up through the stomach, lungs, and finally into his heart, where the bullet fragmented. The Pony platoon leader was dead the instant Hayes saw him stiffen in his seat.

Just three weeks earlier, Pony One Six had been shot down after becoming fixated over a contact area and presenting his airplane as a target the enemy could not miss. Red Hayes was Pony’s crew chief that day also, and he had tried desperately to warn the pilot that he needed to speed up and get out of the enemy’s line of sight. But, for some reason, Pony wouldn’t take Hayes’s advice—on either occasion.

All of us in Darkhorse felt the loss of the Pony platoon leader. It made it worse to realize that his death might have been avoided if he had just given more credence to the scouting lessons that combat experience had taught the Darkhorse scout pilots.

If there was a bright note for that ugly day, it came that evening when we all got back to base. We learned that Bill Jones, though in dangerous condition with second and third degree burns over his upper body, was still alive and had been transferred from Dau Tieng to the evac hospital in Long Binh.

A day or so later I decided that I couldn’t wait any longer to go down to see Bill Jones. Willis, Davis, and I piled into my bird and headed down to Long Binh. When we arrived at the hospital we asked directions to the intensive care unit, shushing Willis as he remarked rather loudly on the notable physical assets of several of the nurses.

Finally finding the ICU, I walked up to the nurses’ station. “I’m Lieutenant Mills from the Quarter Cav, and we’re here to check on one of my pilots. He was brought in here two days ago with burns. His name is William Jones.”

“Yes,” she said, “Warrant Officer Jones is down in the last bed on the right.”

With Davis behind me—Willis was lagging back at thé nurses’ station—I walked down to where the nurse had directed me. I looked at the person in the bed and immediately said out loud, “No, that’s not Bill Jones.”

The guy didn’t look anything like Jones. His head was twice again as big, and so was his body. Besides, the man in the bed was black.

I went back to the nurses’ station. “Ma’am, you made a mistake. The man in the bed down there is not Warrant Officer Jones.”

“Well, Lieutenant,” she answered, “that is Warrant Officer Bill Jones from Delta Troop of the Quarter Cav, and he was brought in here two days ago with burns.”

“But, ma’am,” I argued, “Bill Jones is a skinny little guy, and besides that, he’s white”

It was obvious that I had tried her patience. “You don’t seem to understand, Lieutenant, what second and third degree burns can do to a person. You go on back down there; you’ll find out that’s Mr. Jones.”

Back at his bedside, I studied the person for a moment. The blazing jet fuel that spilled over his upper body had burned away most of the right side of his neck, as well as the right shoulder. The burned areas were charred and had swollen up to monstrous proportions. The distortion was so bad it made the man look twice the size.

I leaned down close and said, “Bill, can you hear me?”

In a very labored whisper he responded, “Yes, who is it?”

“It’s Mills, Jonesy. How are you doing?”

“I feel like shit,” he answered.

Trying to keep it light I retorted, “Well, Bill, you really look like shit. What happened?”

He couldn’t even smile. He was obviously in incredible pain. But he did move his head ever so slightly, and then slowly whispered, “I saw movement… and when I came around, I saw people. I don’t know what hit me.”

“OK, Jonesy,” I said quietly, “we’ll talk about it later. Look, ol’ friend, there isn’t much that any of us can do for you right now, but the guys are thinking about you and wanted to see how you were doing.”

His eyes opened a little bit. “Who’s that with you… is that Fox Bravo?”

“Yes, it’s Davis, and he’s as full of BS as ever.”

“Who else is with you?” he whispered.

“Rod’s with us, too.”

“Bet he’s chasing nurses, right?”

“Well, yes,” I stammered. “He’s back at the nurses’ station talking to some girl from Texas.

“We’re going to take off now, Bill, and let you get some sack time. We’ll catch you later and see how you’re doin’, OK?”