Field Investigation

As memory serves, the Aviation Safety Office was notified of this crash in the vicinity of 12 Noon (or shortly thereafter), on July 21, 1971. There was considerable confusion at the time, but two things were abundantly clear; a Chinook airframe had been completely destroyed and there had been a loss of life. Understandably, the safety or our American flight crew was the overwhelming concern. The SAO at the time was CW4 Lawrence Lisonbee (a former presidential Aircraft Commander; he flew Lyndon Johnson, with 16,000 hours logged) who, in concert with the Battalion commander, LTC Joseph Rutkowski, determined that an assessment in the field was warranted. We headed to the Chu Lai flight line, with the intent of meeting LTC Rutkowski, at his UH-1, and flying to the crash site.

Chief Lisonbee and I were the first to arrive, followed momentarily by LTC Rutkowski's regular Pilot and Crew Chief. Shortly thereafter, the 16th Group Commander (Colonel Silver, I believe) ar arrived with an Australian Lieutenant-advisor to the ARVNs and the 178th CO (a Major whose name I don't recall). Almost immediately, we received word that Battalion CO had been sidetracked and wouldn't make the flight. With the Group CO wanting to get going, and absent the door gunner, I offered to fill in and helped the crew chief ready the Huey. By the time we got the M-60's on, the gunner arrived. With CW4 Lisonbee and Rutkowski's pilot at the controls, we pulled pitch and moved out.

The flight to the crash site was uneventful, but smoke from the wreckage was visible from a considerable distance. As was our protocol, I took a number of pictures of the site from the air. These were taken with an automatic focus 35 mm Canon (Model QL17, Canonette). As indicated (see Photo 1), the wreckage laid at the base of the hill upon which the fire support base was situated. from the air, and given the smoke from the post crash fire, little was discernible as being from a CH-47.

We landed in a clearing about 75 yards from the wreck, surrounded by a platoon of ARVN troops. Between our little LZ and the crash, was a stand of elephant grass that had to be forded. Rather than hacking our way through, the Aussie Lt showed us that falling into the stuff, and using your body weight, it could be made passable with a lot less effort. Though the Huey was initially shut down, we were immediately advised that there ws some concern about hostiles in the area. While the five of us (including Chief Lisonbee) made our way to the crash, the pilot started up the UH-1 and headed off; destination unknown.

We came out of the grass directly into the macabre scene that was the wreckage. With the exception of a portion of the real pylon, there was little that was recognizable as being from a Chinook. (see Photo 2) It was readily apparent that the fuselage tanks had ruptured, adding a significant amount of JP-4 to an inferno of munitions in the cargo hold. The fuselage itself had been almost totally consumed by fire. While nothing was cooking off at the time, there was ammunition, or the remains of it, scattered throughout 

Page 3 - Boxcar Homepage