"D" Troop 3/5th Air Cav had their third annual unit reunion the weekend of 17-20 April 1998. I had been invited to attend. It was an honor that I couldn't refuse. [Maybe even one or two would remember me.]

About 30 of the Dong Tam/Vinh Long Cav members were able to attend this year. The fire in their eyes remains the same, but nobody's Nomex flight suit fit anymore. Among those I met there were Paul Zaneske and Rick Waite. The following is one of the many war stories that filled the days and nights of the reunion. They all began with, "TINS!" (this is no schitt!) To my everlasting regret I wasn't able to record every one. There were just too many going on at the same time. But thanks to the Cybernet, I was able to get total recall on this one.

`Tony Spletstoser'

[Tony] Paul, we were talking the other day about Vietnam Veterans coming home to a different world than the one that they

had left. The anti-war protestors, the disrespect that servicemen received for even being in the military and serving in Vietnam.

I've talked to many friends who, after getting over that, felt another kind of let down. "There was nothing here. This wasn't where it was happening," they would say. Many who could, re-enlisted and volunteered to go back into the horror of Vietnam in order to feel the rush of hanging on a monkey strap at the door of a Huey. Firing a M60 at "Blue on Blue running" was a real turn on for them. Isn't that a hell of a thing for someone to miss?

[Paul] Yes, but I know how they felt. It happened to me also, only I didn't want to go back.

[Tony] After having met me at the "D" troop reunion this year and reading my "D" troop stories on "D" Troop's Web page, I think that it's safe to say that we know something about each other. How about relating a story about your Post Vietnam life. Plus, I'd like for you to tell me more details about Rick Waite and Bill Hangman's "Muddmen" adventure.

[Paul] Well, to begin with, after returning from Vietnam, my life had been filled with anger for many years. That is, until now. This computer `NET' thing is a miracle worker. It is slowly helping me learn where and when to use it. With it I can talk to other people with the Vietnam experience, who can understand the "why" of me. I'll never forget the past but I don't have to let it rule me or my life present and future. One day I hope to have control over it, like my fellow Trooper, Rick Waite.

Thanks to the Net and finding old friends like Rick, I'm getting better.

After Vietnam my head was really screwed up. I had a problem dealing with the loss of two friends over there. Before I went to Vietnam my father ( a WW2 Pacific Veteran ) told me to do your job, watch out for your comrades, but don't get too close to them. Because if they get killed it will haunt you for the rest of your life.

Well, I did my job and I didn't get too close to the guys I flew with. Instead, I had a couple of friends in the maintenance platoon. I figured what the hell could happen to them. Then they got Killed in a stupid vehicle accident. The senselessness of accident was what made it so hard for me to deal with.

After Vietnam I sort of stayed drunk or messed with drugs for about six months. Then one day, with no money left, I figured it was time to get a job. I had lots of those. Gas stations, truck stops, numerous landscaping jobs, etc. Then I got into construction. Started delivering building materials, drywall, cement, stucco wire, plaster material, etc. I got in trouble a few times, did a little jail time. Nothing violent. As I think back I believe my trouble stemmed from a need for some kind of rush or excitement. After Vietnam, everything was sort of flat and dull. I had been used to being high on adrenalin, a natural high. Back here, home in California, there was nothing like it to compare with unless I did something stupid. Finally, I began to realize that I wasn't 19 and I was too old to be doing anymore stupid things. I got myself a contractor's license and went to work in the building trades. Things began to look up.

The bad news is that over the last 12 years I have been `rear-ended' just about every two years. It has taken a toll on my neck and back. Now I am down to doing small jobs and remodels, and the future is not looking any better. But I'm surviving, although I still have a little trouble dealing with public stupidity in this over-populated part of the world that I live in. I bought a couple of small lots in the desert in Arizona; maybe I'll move out to the desert where there would be nothing but me and the "Critters."

This MUDDMEN story is not about Paul Z. It's about two friends of mine, but I guess I can say that I had a part in it.

[Tony] Paul, your post Vietnam troubles were shared by many, but at least you have found a way to work yourself out of them.

[Paul] Rick Waite and his observer Bill Hanegmon, two of the best of the best. Rick was a captain and the RLO of the Warwagon platoon, D troop 3/5th Air Cav. We were based at Vinh Long, RVN then. He flew Scouts, LOHs, Lochs, Loachs, Hughs OH-6As, or whatever you want to call them. They were the quick little birds.

As a Scout pilot, Rick was unforgettable. I was flying CE (crew chief/door gunner) on the Command and Control ship the day that Rick's Loach disintegrated mid air. Rick and his super gunner, Hangman, had been working some fresh bunkers and took heavy fire. Ricks gunner dropped smoke on the targets to mark them for the Cobras. If I remember right, then they broke left as the Cobras came inbound using 40 m/m among other firepower.

As the Lead Cobra broke from its gun run, I saw Rick's LOH explode. It surprised the shit out of me because it was the first mid-air explosion I had seen. The whole damn thing just went poof, gone. My first thought was, we won't even find the pieces. However, I did see two large pieces falling to the ground. As the shock to the C & C crew eased, my AC started to dive in toward where they went in; then we saw these two MUD MEN pop up out of the rice paddy. The Trail Loach had dropped in to a hover near them. They started running and falling, stopping only to help each other get up.

[Rick Waite] I remember it was 3/30/71. (I remember, because I kept my logs) The AO for our S&D mission was about 5 klicks west of Ben Tre city. Ben Tre Island is a fairly large island between two of the many branches of the Mekong river delta. The upriver end is right across from our old Dong Tam base, formerly the home of the US 9th Inf. Div.

We were Scouting an area that intel thought contained a base camp of sorts for some NVA regulars. Intel was right. We came across many well-camouflaged hootchs and bunkers. We could see signs of fresh activity. As my trail and I closed in, we began to receive sporadic fire from several positions. We marked their locations with smoke and asked the Cobras to blow them up for us.    

[Tony] After you and Hangman marked the targets, what did you do?

[Rick] We broke left and began a holding orbit out the line of attack and were waiting until the strike was over. The reason for our `almost' demise was that when the Lead Cobra Broke from its gun run, the Front Seat [gunner] held the trigger on the 40 mike-mike shooter a wee bit too long and lobbed a few off in `never-never' land into our holding orbit. We had been stooging around about 25-50 feet over the rice paddy at an IAS of about 50 kts.

Then the next moment for me, BLAMM! Then all there was blackness and the Paddy Mud. Stunned, we unstrapped ourselves from the Loach seats that we rode in on, then stood up out of the Mud. Bill and I looked at each other and asked where the hell had the rest of the unit gone. We couldn't hear anything. [The blast from the explosion must have dampened our ears for a few moments.]

Then we heard our Trail Loach approaching. It held there at a hover while we did our best to walk toward it. The bad news was that we were now being shot at from the bunkers in the tree line. We tried to run, but the rice paddy was about thigh deep and we kept falling. We must have looked like two of the `Three Stooges' falling over each other then helping ourselves up again. But it wasn't very funny to us.

We finally made it to our Trail Loach and climbed aboard.

The Command and Control Slick was in bound low-level right behind the Loach... The Cobra team were firing rockets and mini-guns into the surrounding tree lines doing their best to keep the Bad Guys heads down. I recall that it was pretty damn exciting at the time. The Trail Loach got us clear of the danger and found a quiet place for the C&C ship to sit down.

The C&C commander had us transferred to his aircraft thinking that we were more seriously hurt than we were. Once we were checked out, we got off at the "D" troop flight line. Later we found another Loach, and continued our mission.

[Tony] What other kinds of ordnance were you carrying?

[Rick] My observer, Hanegomon, had constructed a homemade bomb that day out of a Mini-gun ammo can.... It must have weighed about 50 pounds. Claude Stevens and some of the other guys had worked with him building it. Hangman loaded it into the aircraft. I was real pissed off because he had set it in between the seats.

When I woke up in the rice paddy, at first I thought that the "thing" had blown up. But then I realized that the left side of my body was still there. It was only later that I was able to learn what happened.

[Paul] Yes, that's the way I remember it. My AC flew to a relatively safe area out of range of those treelines and had the Trail Loach set down. The Captain thought sure that Rick and Bill needed medical attention and wanted to transfer the men to his C&C ship. As my AC swooped down, they jumped in my ship and away we went, with the two of them cussing and swearing. Yes, I know it's hard to believe Rick would use bad language, but I think he was a little upset at the time. I don't Remember Rick having any wounds to anything but his pride and ego. His gunner was playing with his tongue. Seems a piece of plexiglass went through the gunner's cheek and I think it cut a groove through his tongue.

Now, I think most people would take the rest of the day off. WRONG. When we got back to Vinh Long, Rick and his Gunner Bill Hangemon commandeered another ship and away they went. Payback time. The rumor and questions started almost immediately. Someone asked did they get hit by a B-40 RPG, etc, etc, then came the possibility of that a 40 m/m from the Cobra hitting them on the break.

Either way it was some weird shit. You hear about that slow motion stuff, but that is how it seemed to me at the time.

I watched my share of lead LOH crews while I was there, but Rick and Bill, shit, what can I say? These guys were something special. It was like their brains worked as one. Their thoughts, instincts, and reactions were all in sync.

It was a joy to watch them work, and sometimes a little weird. A lot of the stuff they did would make the average person PUKE. But the two of them got my vote for the "BADDEST" LOH crew of all time, and it was and is a pleasure to know the both of them. I am thankful they both made it home. [I forgot to say that those two large pieces of wreckage that hit the ground were Rick and Bill still strapped in their seats.] The one thing I can't remember is, who my gunner was that day on the Huey.

[Tony] Rick, can you help us with this? Our 28-year-old memmories are fading fast.

[Rick] I will do the best that I can. I think that I can give you names of all the folks who were there that day.

Subject: "A 40 m/m downs Loach."....

Our Trail Loach that day was flown by Bill Weyrich and the Door Gunner Observer was Thomas LaCrosse....Later in his tour Thomas Lacrosse got hit in the elbow, and so got to come home earlier.

The C&C Pilot that day was Cpt. John Sorenson... He was at the Reunion in Atlanta.

Johnny Helms was the Cobra Pilot AC. Johnny and I have always been good friends. Except for that day for some reason or another??
His front seat, the Pete, who was the man on the 40mm was John McCray. [John died three years ago from cancer.] Later the Trail pilot told me that he watched while the Cobra walked those 40 mike-mikes right on across my Loach, with one round hitting the main rotor causing Aircraft to explode.

Webmaster's Note: It has been determined that Johnny Helms and John Mc Cray (RIP) were not the Cobra crew that shot Rick and Bill down. Crusader Chris Rummel has "fessed up" to being the guilty party in this incident..
Most humble Apologies to Johnny and McCray's family for the error.

John McCray may have had `target fixation' and had failed to notice my Loch flying across in his gun sight picture.

Your details on Hanegman's injuries are correct with the exception that the Chicken plate he was wearing nearly beat him to death when we splashed into the paddy.

My only injuries were some fragments from the 40 m/m in my arms and bruising of the family jewels. The Cyclic stick, being directly linked to the rotor head, had severely beat up my crotch while the rotor system destroyed its self. Which later caused my balls to turn a terrible color of green.

Our Trail Loach initially picked us up with the C&C amd you [Paul] hot on his trail. You came in low-level. Then Cpt. Sorenson suggested a transfer because he thought we were more badly hurt then we were.

George Schmitz was leading the second Fire Team that day and was sent back out to destroy what was left of our Loach (#058). Later, George told me that they couldn't find anything left to destroy. Apparently the aircraft had literally disintegrated as we fell into the paddy.

Lost my fucking Cav hat that day too!

There wasn't anything left of that fucking aircraft, just us. However, we knew that if we told the true story on what had happened, Johnny would have got into some really deep shit.

And it was an accident and so we left it that way. Half the time those Fucking Cobras couldn't hit anything on purpose anyway.

[Paul] We used to start out on these S&D (search and destroy) missions with four Slicks (UH-1D/H),four Cobras and four Scout ships. They would set up at a staging aera and the S&D Light Fire Team would go out with one C&C Slick, two Cobras, two scout Loachs.

[Rick] Oh Yeah! The correct spelling of my gunner's name is "Hanegmon." You guys as well as the rest of us liked "Hangman" better! Sort of fit him, didn't it? He was one of the best. The only reason I looked so damn good was because of him. To this day I haven't met a braver man! Thanks again, Paul, for getting this story started.

[Tony] Paul, what else can you tell about Rick and Bill?

[Paul] As for more escapades of Rick and Bill, there is another really good one but it cannot be made public because of Bill's job. Bill, now I am told, is a police officer up in Hibbing, Minn. I think someone said he is a Swat sniper. Big Fucking surprise, NOT!

[Tony] Rick and Bill's "accident" was a total fluke. A fluke that it happened and a fluke that they survived. While this time the type of aircraft being a Loach had no bearing on their being alive, the Hughes OH-6A, was the best aircraft that Army ever had, the most crash survivable, Loachs were amazing. I've seen them totally destroyed and the crew climb out and be looking for another one, so they could go back out to the AO.

[Rick] Bill Hanegmon is now a detective with the St. Louis County Sheriff's Department in Hibbing, Minnesota. My chosen life's work is that of a private detective in Dalton, Georgia. Not exactly a Sam Spade, but close.

As for our slang name for the Hughes OH-6A helicopter, we called it the "Loach," a corruption of the acronym "LOH" = Light Observation Helicopter. Our 1 1/2 ton vehicle we used to drive out to the flight line in the morning was called the Loach Coach. Most other Scout pilots I deal with also called it the Loach. Maybe others called it the Loch, but I'll let you make the call on that. Best damn aircraft in the world. we never had anyone killed in a crash. There were lots of people shot up but not a single casualty in a crash while I was there. Thank God for the Hughes Tool Company!

Paul Zaneske, CE, Longknives, "

D" Trp 3/5th Air Cav, Vinh Long, RVN `70-`71

Rick Waite, WarWagon 19,

"D" Trp 3/5th Air Cav, Vinh Long, RVN, `70-`71

Bill Hanegmon, CE, WarWagon,

"D" Trp 3/5th Air Cav.,Vinh Long, RVN, `70-`71