FAC Fantasy
Those of us who got tired of
being an 80-knot target in the North Vietnamese’s Laotian shooting gallery
often wished we could pack some offensive ordnance instead of just our 4
white-phosphorous marking rockets, an M-16, and .38 caliber combat
masterpiece.
This napalm canister suggests a
potential alternative. Obviously
this is an empty or the Bird Dog would be over on its wingtip, or the wing
might have broken right off. This
picture probably was taken in 1966 when the troops had some extra time on
their hands.
Note the thin line of angled
tubing sticking up from the nose just aft of the propeller. That was our
aiming sight, when used in combination with a grease pencil mark we put on the
windshield after we settled into the cockpit.
The small tail number, small star on the fuselage and the square frame
around that American national marking identify this Bird Dog as being a 23rd
TASS bird at NKP.
My log book lists just over 15
flight hours with 937 as my aircraft on 25 Feb, 13 April, 13 July, 16 July, 18
July, and 14 Sept 1967. Our performance together generally wasn’t
particularly distinguished. 25
Feb was an air abort due to bad weather and an OK landing.
13 April included bad thunderstorms but good visibility with a Dropped
it in—looked good landing. The
landing on 13 July was judged as Bouncy.
On 16 July, I Dropped it in! On
14 September, I flew local Visual Reconnaissance around the base, didn’t get
any credit for a combat mission, and ended up with an OK (Bouncy) landing.
Our only mission of some real distinction came on 18 July when we
parked over the Big Rooster Tail and I briefed 14 flights of fighters to hand
off to a pair of Nail FACs attacking what had been reported nearly a month
earlier as the headquarters of the Central Pathet Lao region.
