Double Dog Dare on the Flight Line

        Phantom

                Huey

Fighter Pilots are the strutting peacocks of the military. Perhaps of the world.

This seems to have been true since WWI, and would probably have been true even earlier had there been airplanes any earlier.

A good collective noun for the group would be, “A Swagger of Pilots.”

This fighter pilot swagger had been developed to a high art form by the time of the Vietnam War. And close behind them, particularly after the internal application of Officer Club drinks, were Army helicopter pilots.

In most places, Army and Air Force Officers Clubs were on separate bases, but Bien Hua in South Vietnam was a Joint Base, Army and Air Force, and had one club. So, these two groups often found themselves together, with only their friend Jim Beam between them. Nightly, of course, began the scholarly discussion of relative flying prowess. This night, the discourse reached the “am not-am too” phase, and then the wagering phase began. The two delegations caucused, took collections, and soon there were two piles of $100 on the bar. The bet was set. Then the negotiation of terms began, along with more Beam negotiation lubrication.

An aside. Even for Junior Officers, $100 was quite a bit of money in those times. Plus, mixed drinks in the O Club were only 25 cents each. So, the lubrication was easier to assemble than the wager. The O Club in question was nothing fancy. Basically a concrete slab with a tin roof and screen wire walls. But, other than flying, there wasn't much else for our sky jockeys to do, so much time was spent there. The attractions were cheap drinks, bragging rights, and the nightly performance of rock bands. The bands were Korean or Filipino, and sang heavily accented covers of American hits. The music was not the draw. Each band had two to three go go dancers. These weren't technically strippers, but one would need to carefully read the technical literature to determine the difference. And one must remember, these pilots were all still shy of their 25^th birthday. So, what we have is a formula of testosterone, bourbon, scantily clad women, and boredom all blended in what are basically still adolescent brains.

Arriving at the conclusion of the negotiations, it was determined that one of the hardest feats in flying was to hover a helicopter, and that a flight line full of fueled Hueys was less than a half mile away. The bet was, could an Air Force F-4 pilot hover a chopper. If so, the AF won the bet. As a delegation of the whole, all decamped in a cloud of bourbontosterone, headed for the unsuspecting whirlybirds.

Located deep within a large, heavily-guarded base, the 'copters were neatly line up just about rotor tip to rotor tip. There were, of course, guards surrounding the airfield, but their focus was outward, looking for VC sneaking in, and they paid little attention to a group of boisterous pilots walking on the tarmac. That was not a rare sight. Even late at night.

The expensively trained and equipped warriors chose a Huey. For reasons known only to them, and to St. Murphy, the patron saint of flight, they chose one from the middle of the line, rather than either end.

Per the specifications of the bet, one of the Army helicopter pilots climbed aboard and fired up the bird. Lt. F-4 Phantom was confidently going to take to the air in a jet powered machine he didn't even know how to start. The AF wizard clambered aboard and strapped himself into the seat. The spectators quickly gave him plenty of maneuver room.

Goosing the jet turbine to a high scream, flyboy began to randomly manipulate controls to, “just see what this bird will do.”

What the bird did was to bounce, twist, and slam back and forth between the neighboring choppers. It was Huey pinball in the glare of the flight line mercury lights. Shards of plexiglass, smashed rotor tips, sheet metal, and other no-longer-identifiable aircraft parts filled the air. In a spectacular spray of expensive alloy, the engine rotors disintegrated, sending turbine blades bursting the housing and flying through the lights into the darkness. The pinball game didn't last long, and ended with aircraft 1 lying on its side, smoking and leaking JP-4 jet fuel, between the wrecked bodies of aircraft 2 and 3. The bet-losing pilot crawled out of the smoking fuselage, unhurt and looking for a drink.

Two Corporals from the airfield guard came running up, decked out in helmets, flack jackets, M-16s, and looks of astonishment. Their butts began to pucker as they pictured themselves being held responsible for the destruction of millions of dollars worth of government property they were supposed to be guarding. Then comes roaring up a jeep with the Officer of the Day. His first thoughts included questions about how the brass would hold him responsible for this. A quick meeting of everyone on the scene decided that they all had something to lose, and nothing to gain, from the scene of smoking wreckage.

In the end, everyone, including to base Commanding Officer, agreed that what had obviously happened was that two or three Vietcong Sappers had sneaked on to the base, with the intent of stealing a helicopter. On hearing the engine start, over the sound of the Korean rock band, and from half a mile away, the group of both Air Force and Army pilots instantly deduced what was happening and rushed to the field to stop it. They arrived just in time, and the panicked VC crashed the helicopter they were trying to steal. As was usual, the VC used the confusion of battle to slip off and escape into the night. ALL agreed, this is exactly what must have happened. There was no other logical explanation.

The F-4 pilot at the center of the action discovered that he did have a bleeding cut on his left pinky. On the basis of this wound, he applied for a Purple Heart, because Phantom Jet pilots usually had to be on the losing end of a confrontation with a MIG or a Surface to Air Missile to get a Purple Heart—and then got them posthumously. Command denied the request.