Helicopter UH-1C 66-15161


Information on U.S. Army helicopter UH-1C tail number 66-15161
The Army purchased this helicopter 0667
Total flight hours at this point: 00001482
Date: 12/16/1969
Incident number: 69121636.KIA
Unit: 336 AHC
This was a Combat incident. This helicopter was REPAIRED
for Close Air Support
Unknown this helicopter was Unknown at UNK feet and UNK knots.
Unknown
Helicopter took 1 hits from:
Small Arms/Automatic Weapons; Gun launched non-explosive ballistic projectiles less than 20 mm in size. (7.62MM)
Systems damaged were: PERSONNEL
Casualties = 01 KIA . .
The helicopter Continued Flight.
The aircraft was diverted prior to accomplishing any mission objectives.
Original source(s) and document(s) from which the incident was created or updated: Survivability/Vulnerability Information Analysis Center Helicopter database. Also: UH1P3, 35001, Larry Congen ()
Summary: Front of aircraft was hit by automatic weapons fire during close gunship support of friendlies in contact.

Crew Members:
AC CW2 BRITTENUM OSCAR LEE JR KIA
P CPT CONGEN LARRY
CE SEGURA RAUL


War Story:
Britt was flying as my copilot on Dec. 16, 1969. This was scheduled to be his last flying day in country prior to his DEROS. We were working an area about 30 miles north of Vin Long and had covered several insertions that morning with no contact. We were flying a "hog" so the copilot has little to do. While we were set down at Vin Long for lunch, Britt ask me to fly right seat that afternoon. Since it was his last flying day in country and he was also a Fire Team Lead, I agreed. When we returned to the AO, the ground troops were under heavy close contact. On our first gun run, to avoid hitting friendlies, we came in from about 500 ft. Britt was on target firing rockets when we started taking automatic weapons fire. A round came through the windshield and struck Britt in the right temple and came out the back of his head. I am sure it was machine gun fire but I don't think it was 50 caliber. I remember barely pulling the aircraft out of the dive before we crashed. He had kicked in full left pedal and we had a really hard time getting his foot off the pedal. The crew chief (Raul Segura I think but not sure) crawled over the console and was able to move his foot when I was on final at Vin Long. He was still alive when we got there but died a short time later. T-Bird Chief came up and I flew as his copilot the rest of the day. We took a lot of fire but wound up with several KBA's with the help of a Cobra light fire team that afternoon and evening. It was a tough day. Submitted to the VHPA in November 2001 by Larry Congen, T-BIRD 5 via J. Larry Beddingfield.

This record was last updated on 11/14/2001


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Date posted on this site: 11/13/2023


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