I REMEMBER
This is Mike's short story of an unusual Centaurs Slick pilot checkride during his tenure as Troop's UH-1D Instructor Pilot.
Date: Easter Sunday 1968
Crew: Aircraft Commander (AC) WO Mike Siegel, Pilot John Whitehead, unidentified Crew Chief and Door Gunner.
I was in D troop from 9/67 to 9/68. I had been in a car accident after flight school (class 67-7, graduated in June of '67) and I came to the unit as a rusty FNG. I flew as as a copilot with Joe Bridges who was more than patient with me. I became an Aircraft commander in either Dec. 67 or Jan 68 and my call sign was Centaur 36. As a slick driver, most of my missions were 'single ship.' I was often flying "Ash and Trash", like driving a cab or bus or truck - taking people and supplies from one place to another. Honorable work, but pretty mundane most of the time.
One other story: I was the D model instructor pilot. Many of you will recall that every pilot had to have a checkride every 90 days. Because we were busy, I would usually just fly with each pilot for a day and call it a check ride. On Easter Sunday of '68, I gave a check ride to Capt John Whitehead who was my platoon commander. Shit happened and we ended up doing medevac flights for 2 different ground units most of the day and some of the night. It wasn't pretty. John was an excellent pilot (he is the guy that taught me the U-turn take off) and he did much of the flying. I have no idea how many sorties we did, but it was a lot. The guys on the ground were pretty happy and wrote us up. John got the Silver Star, I got my 2nd and 3rd DFC, and the guys in the back were both decorated as well. Sorry that I don't remember names. My memory of the details is foggy, but I remember being scared most of the day.
If anyone can fill in the blanks I'd sure appreciate it.
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