Air Support at Ia Drang

[Pyros]

Pleiku Province, II Corps, South Vietnam

Location, LZ X-Ray

Description:
0?H 2 A/229th Avn UH-1D's and 2 UH-1B's make a recon flight from Plei Me to Duc Co and identify 3 possible LZs.

0?H 5 CH-47A's start moving 6 105mm guns to LZ Falcon.

0?H 1/9th Cav Scouts conduct a VR of 2 LZs and the surrounding area.

0852H LZ X-Ray is selected.

By 0930 all 16 A/229th Avn UH-1D's arrive at Plei Me for the CA.

C/2/20th ARA provided support all that day.

1048H the first lift of 8 UH-1Ds landed in X-Ray, the second wave follwed immediately.

1120H the second lift went in.

The 1/7th C&C ship landed at 1140H to extract the NVA POW. <<

1210H the third lift went in and at 1215H contact was made to begin the Battle of LZ X-Ray.

After refueling, the fourth lift went in at 1332H.

At 1338H the second wave started receiving ground fire.

After this lift was complete, a medevac ship brought in the Bn Surgeon's team which reported they already had 20 to 25 WIA's and some KIA's.

At 1400 the USAF Spad crashed and ARA fire was directed on the NVA moving around the aircraft.

At 1430 the fifth lift went in and the LZ suddenly turned red-hot.

The Hueys dropped off troops and extracted KIAs and WIAs.
Because the first wave received such heavy fire and took so many hits, the 1/7th cancelled the second wave.
Two Hueys were dispatched to Camp Holloway to collect ammo.
Two Hueys loaded all the remaining 1/7th ammo at Plei Me and returned to X-Ray.
They extracted 13 WIAs and KIAs on this trip.
The two Hueys from Holloway returned and went into X-Ray, one was shot down in X-Ray and the crew extracted.
A/229th continued to fly in ammo and extract casualties.
Instead of flying the WIAs all the way to Pleiku, they used LZ Falcon as a transfer point to the medevac ships.
After three two ship missions, all of A/229th set up a shuttle flying in ammo and water, taking out casualties.

At 1520H they started bringing in the last of the 1/7th Cav two ships at a time.

A second Huey went down in X-Ray.

Comments: MAJ Crandall, Bruce; A/229th Avn CO; ; CPT Mills, Jon; A/229th Avn pilot; ;
CPT Rickard, ; 1/9th Cav scout leader; ; CWO Lombardo, Riccardo J.; A/229th Avn AC; ;
1LT Bean, Roger K.; A/229th Avn pilot; ; CPT Freeman, Ed; A/229th Avn flight leader; ; CPT
Mesch, Gene; A/229th Avn AC; ; CWO Jekel, Alex S.; A/229th Avn AC; ; MAJ
Bartholomew, Roger J.; C/2/20th ARA CO; ; CPT Washburn, Richard B.; C/2/20th ARA
pilot; ; CPT Winkel, Paul P.; A/229th Avn flight leader; ; CWO Harper, Dallas H.; A/229th
Avn AC; ; CWO Faba, Ken; A/229th Avn AC; ; CWO Komich, Leland C.; A/229th Avn pilot;
; CWO Schramm, Walter; A/229th Avn pilot; ; CWO Estes, Donald C; A/229th Avn AC;

[Pyros]

Post deleted by Pyros

[Pyros]

Taking his M-60 machineguns off the perimeter and putting them in the dead pile when the crew was wounded or killed

I'll bet the C company commander would have liked to have had a few of the "EXTRA" "SPARE" machineguns in his sector, C company was Moores unit that was overran, how many of C company's machineguns were in the dead pile, and became spare? but with Custers luck the enemy stopped to strip off all the american weapons and then retreated.

in the D company sector which was only 75 meters long, Lt. Col. Moore put 9 or more M-60 Machineguns in that 75 meters, a machinegun every 8 meters with a crew of 4 troops per machinegun and 6,000 rounds of ammo per machinegun, thats 7 1/2 cases of ammo, each case has 4 containers of 200 rounds each total 800 rounds, a total of 30 containers, thats 60,100 round belts of ammo. the weight of each case is about 80 pounds, for a total weight of about 600 pounds.

For comparesion the UH-1B Gunship had 4 M-60 machineguns and 6,000 rounds was the basic load for the 4 machineguns.