Bush Flying, pt 3 - Beaver 11.jpg (1/1)

In article , Mitchell Holman
says...

Stormin' Norman wrote in
:

On Wed, 23 Jan 2019 07:39:48 -0600, Mitchell Holman
wrote:

De Havilland made some very impressive aircraft. Thanks for posting.



"Anything you can close the door on"
was the byword for what a Beaver could
carry..........




My aviation company in VNam had three of them in addition to helicopters. I
wound up about as far south as you can go in SVietnam and at midnight had to fly
one back to Saigon...the site was unsecure so we couldn't stay overnight. The
pilot was fixed wing qualified but outranked me...a first lieutenant...he gave
me the controls to fly as soon as we were airborne while he went to sleep!

As there was no electricity in those days the only visible lights on the horizon
were the city of Saigon in the far distance...had to fly on instruments almost
the entire flight...easier to do than in a helicopter.

Flew unto an island, landing it on a open field...you can't lock the doors so we
took what we could while visiting some of our personnel...what was left in the
U-6 was stolen! Found out later the Vietnamese name of the island translated to
"Island of Thieves"

On another flight, the prop seal broke while in flight causing oil to splatter
all over the windscreen...since we couldn't very well, the pilot had to land
while sticking his head out the side window to see where he was landing as he
was bringing it in.

....but great plane...reliable radial engine...will go anywhere...carry just
about anything...forgiving to fly but loud!



*