Listening to every transmission from 35,000 feet
Episode 14.
Now, for the men in the F-105s, the SAM battle is also right beneath you in the Son Tay area.
Firebird 1, 2, 3, and 4, using roughly perpendicular inbound tracks, take turns launching on the radar signals of live SAM sites. Multiple SAMs are launching at them. In the night, a flying SA-2 looks like a telephone pole balanced on a reddish orange fireball oscillating as its gimbals respond to the radio telemetry signals.
A little perspective: Out of the hundreds of combat missions flown by the crewmembers in tonight’s mission, for almost all of them, this was the first time ever to have a SAM actually launch on them.
2:37am. Apple 1 begins re-boarding the first two groups of Green Berets just outside the Son Tay POW camp walls for exfiltration.
2:40am. Apple 1 departs the Son Tay POW camp.
Also at 2:40am: As Firebird 3 turns away from a target at 12,000 feet, a SAM launches. If the SAM is not moving in your windscreen, that’s when you know it’s headed for you. From Firebird 5’s vantage above, the huge explosion fireball seems to engulf Firebird 3, but then he hears, “Mayday, Mayday. Firebird 3 is hit.” The Firebird 3 pilot, Major Bill Starkey, gives Firebird 1 a status.
Extremely excited voices in the SAM van declare something like, “Bắn rỏi tại chỗ!” (Shot down on the spot!!) “…on the spot” is a very North Vietnamese way of speaking.
A minute later, Firebird 1 asks 3 if he needed to go home. Starkey replies “Yes, I think I better.” They are out of the fight, but still flyable. They turn toward the southwest and head home high above the lethal altitude of the massive barrage that has now developed.
2:41am. Apple 2 lands to pick up the last group of the ground force.
2:45am. Apple 2 departs the Son Tay POW camp.
Firebird 5 is now ordered into the fight.
See more photos and stories on this website and in Who Will Go, which is just as much to honor the wives and family as the men themselves.
Click Here: The audiobook is now available.