Pacific Stars and Stripes information
for C/1/9 CAV 1 CAV

For date 680802


C/1/9 CAV 1 CAV was a US Army unit
Primary service involved, US Army
Thua Thien Province, I Corps, South Vietnam
Location, Camp Evans
Description: General Zips In to Save 3 Downed Fliers Photo Caption - GEN. RICHARD L. IRBY CAMP EVANS, Vietnam (Special) - "I remember looking up and seeing the general, carrying me in ...then I passed out." WO Howard Miller was telling how Brig. Gen. Richard L. Irby, commander of the 1st Air Cav. Div., rescued him and two other men from the flaming wreckage of a helicopter on a sandbar five miles north of here. The other two have been flown to the States. Only Miller is left here to tell how it was from their side. Miller was an observer on a light observation chopper from C Troop of the 9th Cav's 1st Sq. The craft was making a low recon sweep over a suspected enemy position. The suspicions were well founded. Enemy fire peppered the copter. Black smoke trailed from it as the helicopter fell into a river bed and settled on the little sandbar. "The pilot and I jumped out of the chopper and got as far away as we could." Miller recalled. Both men had been hurt in the crash. Then they remembered the crew chief was still in the smoldering craft. Miller dashed back. The pilot had collapsed. "When I found him he was still strapped in. His uniform was on fire and he was unconscious," Miller said. He hauled the man out and rolled him into the river shallows to squelch the flames. Then he carried the still un-conscious soldier across the sandbar. Two minutes later the helicopter exploded. As it turned out, it was the explosion that saved them. Irby had been flying his UH1 "Huey" copter toward Camp Evans when he heard a radio report on the observation craft's downing. He headed for the crash area. "We saw the ship explode and headed for the locale," Irby said later. The Huey circled the wreck. There was no room for a landing on the sandbar. He put down on another one close by. "It wasn't much of a sandbar," the general said with a smile. Miller agreed. "He had one skid on the sandbar and the other over the side in the water," he said. "He (Irby) and the co-pilot did a remarkable job of recovery. I for one am awfully grateful. It took a lot of pilot technique to land where he did. He wasn't more than 20 yards from where our craft had been hit." The rescue took only minutes. As the general and his crew loaded the wounded men into the Huey, another observation copter circled overhead to provide protection from the nearby enemy. "There was a lot of scrap flying around." Miller recalled, "but we couldn't tell if it was just from the wreck." Miller doesn't remember much after that, Irby lifted off and made it safely back to the 15th Medical Bn. dispensary at Evans. Irby didn't say much about it all. "We saw a job to be done and we did it. That's all there is to it." Miller and his two Stateside buddies think it was quite a job.
Comments: BG Irby, Richard L.; ; ; WO Miller, Howard; ; ;

The source for this information was 6807PSS.AVN supplied by Les Hines


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Date posted on this site: 05/13/2023