Helicopter AH-1G 66-15297

Information on U.S. Army helicopter AH-1G tail number 66-15297
The Army purchased this helicopter 1067
Date: 02/12/1971
Incident number: 71021244.KIA
Unit: 187 AHC
This was Combat Major Damage caused by being shot down by Ground Fire less than .50 cal in size with the mission function of Armed Helicopter (having primary weapon subsystems installed and utilized to provide direct fire support)
This was a Combat incident. This helicopter was UNK
for Close Air Support
Unknown this helicopter was Unknown at UNK feet and UNK knots.
Cambodia
Unknown groundfire.
Systems damaged were: PERSONNEL
Casualties = 01 DOI . .
Search and rescue operations were Not Required
The helicopter Crashed. unknown.
Both mission and flight capability were terminated.
Unknown
Original source(s) and document(s) from which the incident was created or updated: Survivability/Vulnerability Information Analysis Center AVDAC database. Survivability/Vulnerability Information Analysis Center Helicopter database. Also: CASRP (Casualty Report. )
Helicopter was recovered

Crew Members:
AC WOODS RODNEY K
P CPT SIDDONS JAMES GARLAND KIA

Passengers and/or other participants:
SP5 JOHNSON WILLIAM JOHN, AR, CE, KIA

War Story:
CPT James G. Siddons was the gun platoon (Rat Pack) leader, my roommate, and my front seat that day. The AH-1G that we went down in Cambodia was 66-297. I was the assigned aircraft commander for this cobra. SP5 William J. Johnson was the crew chief of the CC Huey and was killed by the rotor blades of my cobra (66-297) while attempting to retrieve Siddons' body. Unfortunately, I do not have the tail number of the Huey. The Siddons family mentioned that the records showed us getting shot down in Laos. We were 10 miles southeast of the Cambodian capitol on the east side of the Mekong shooting up a NVA/VC supply area along a tributary. Tail rotor was shot out during my second gun run. After briefly flying inverted, which the cobra wasn't designed to do I successfully auto-rotated. All the problems ensued once on the ground. Some full-bird colonel at 1st AVN Brigade sent me a "thank-you" note regarding me getting the cobra down were it could be pipe-smoked and used another day. The Brigade also came up with a SOP that required flight crews to "sit" in their downed aircraft until the rotors stopped turning. As on the 12th of Feb 71 when you are taking ground fire, once on the ground, waiting for the rotors to stop was obviously not thought about by two of the flight that day. Rodney K. Woods Rat 31/The Tattooed Rat (May 70 - May 71) E-mail: cobrarat31@aol.com

This record was last updated on 04/15/2004

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Date posted on this site: 11/13/2023