Page Updated 01/29/16

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Photo's courtesy of Bob Taylor ASE-3 VW-1 Det C 1967-1970.. unless noted otherwise

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• Pictured 1st. from the left: VW-1 Det "C" sign with their logo. ILLEGITIMI TATUM NON CARBORUNDOM...Do we have to say more!
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: Another of VW-1 Det "C" signs.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: This is where we lived, slept (line crew and duty officer), and worked. Avionics vans were to the right of the hut. The line crew had bunks surronded by lockers as our sleeping area. We built a "sun powered" (heated) shower out of a fuel drum in the back. Would have to fill it from a water buffalo every morning. We were "green" back then and didn't know it!
  
  Pictured 4th. from the left: VW-1 Det "C" Ground Pounders with our mascot Charlie Victor circa TET 1968
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• The first 3 pictures from the left Show the perimeter road en-route to the Naval Supply Depot about 10 miles away. It's where aircrews bunked. Ground pounders would get duty driver assignment to transport aircrews and other support personnel to their barracks. Along the road there were many bunkers, the 3rd. photo is the check point between MAG 13 and perimeter road.
  
  Notice the bunker is "open", we learned a little latter that they needed to afford better protection for us.
  
  
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• Pictured 1st. from the left: This rocket crater was just about 10 yards away from our bunker in Feb 1968, I remembered this attack because it was right around my 20th birthday.
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: We were getting "hit" quite regularly so we strengthened and enclosed our bunker, which previously did not have an over head covering. Compare to the photo above. Thats me Robert Taylor, at my bunker.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: VW-1 DET-C ASE3 Taylor at one of the "open" bunkers.
  
  This picture was taken at the Naval Supply Depot. The river channel is in the background and I'm wearing a 45 so I must have been duty driver that day or had to transport aircrew.
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• Pictured on the left: ASE Bob Taylor on board a "landing craft" escorting a squadron member to the hospital ship USS Repose to get fitted for new glasses. This was easily remembered because we had Vietnamese women and children on board to get them medical attention. The seas were rough and they screamed and cried all the way to the ship. We had to form a "chain" up the side of the sea ladder and pass the women and children up to the next person on the ladder. "
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: About a week later the USS Repose was back off the coast of Chu Lai and my shipmates glasses would be ready. This time we took the easy way out to the ship.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: The coast of Chu Lai, Viet Nam from our Huey en route to the USS Repose. They don't close the doors so your looking down into the ocean!
  
  Pictured 4th. from the left: Landing approach to the hospital ship USS Repose.
  
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• Pictured on the left: TE-4, TE-9 and TE-8 on the flight line Chu Lai. "
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: 4 connies on the Chu Lai flight line the only side numbers that can be read are TE-4 and TE-9.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: 2 VW-1 connies on the ramp. Buno numbers are not legible in this photo.
  
  Pictured 4th. from the left: I was riding the brakes on and engine turn up of TE-8 and took a photo op.
  
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• Pictured on the left: VW-1 Det "C" Ground Pounders with mascot Charlie Victor circa TET 1968.
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: DET C was between the Marine hangers (shown here) and the hills from which "Charlie" would launch rocket attacks. Some would always fall short and hit our area.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: Heading to the swimming beach where we would swim with the sharks!
  
  
  
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• Pictured on the left: Tet Offensive Jan 1968, the hole was made by a 122 mm rocket. The story was that if the rocket had hit the taxi way, it would have taken out our airplane. We did have a few pieces of very sharp shrapnel in the skin of the a/c..
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: The guy in the NVA rocket crater I believe was Charles Failla, Crew 2 This photo was taken on January 31, 1968, the morning after the initial TET attack. It is also the day our crew was schedule to leave for Guam (via R&R in the Philippians). If the rocket had hit the tarmac ramp, TE2 would not have been airworthy. What the picture doesn't show was the other rocket hit, also in the sand about 5 feet off the ramp on the other side. (comment by Chris Seal)
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: Skip Richardson standing near the entrance to the VW-1 bunker
  
  Pictured 4th. from the left: VW-1 Crew 11 at Chu-Lai.
  
  Photo 1 provided by Bob Hunter VW-1 '67-'69
  Photo's 2 & 3 provided by LT. Skip Richardson VW-1 '68-'70 TE-3.
  
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• Pictured on the left: Aircraft carrier on Yankee Station in the Gulf of Tonkin
  
  Pictured 2nd. from the left: Approach to runway at Chu Lai.
  
  Pictured 3rd. from the left: Red Crown, our boss while on station.
  PIRAZ is a United States Navy acronym for Positive Identification Radar Advisory Zone. The zone is defined by the air search radar coverage of a ship patrolling a designated PIRAZ station. The PIRAZ ship requires a Naval Tactical Data System radio-linked computer installation to effectively identify and track all aircraft anticipated to enter the airspace of the zone during combat.
  The first PIRAZ ships were USS Chicago, King, Mahan, and Long Beach. Belknap class frigates began rotating into PIRAZ station assignments in 1967; and USS Wainwright, assisted in the Son Tay Raid on 21 November 1970.
  While on station the ship would be assigned the call sign of Red Crown. ( From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. )
  
  Pictured 4th. from the left: TE-5 on the ramp at Chu Lai.
  
  Photo's provided by LT. Skip Richardson VW-1 '68-'70 TE-3.
  
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