Like they needed to carry more troops, be able to move more equipment, so they wanted a bigger aircraft. “The Huey was a great aircraft, but when we got into the Cold War era and stuff like, they realized they needed an aircraft that could do more. However, the UH-1 has since been replaced with the UH-60, or Blackhawk helicopter, because the military wanted something bigger, faster and more powerful.Īctive duty and National Guard units started transitioning to the Blackhawk in the ’80s. The Huey revolutionized Army combat operations. Vietnam was where Army aviation took off. Haga said Mowry later discovered he had flown 823 in Vietnam. There, he recreated the nose art he first painted almost 50 years ago. Huey pilot Russ Mowry found out about the Liberty War Birds’ restoration of Huey 823 on the 170th AHC Facebook page and drove down to Carlisle, Pennsylvania to meet Haga and the aircraft at the United States Army Heritage and Education Center’s annual Army Heritage Days event last May. The company adopted the nickname “Bikinis.” The two flight platoons were nicknamed, “Bikini Blue,” and “Bikini Red,” and a custom painted picture of “Annie Fannie,” of Playboy fame, was featured next to a winged dragon on each aircraft’s nose. She was part of the 170th Assault Helicopter Company out of Fort Benning in Georgia. Huey 823 accumulated over 1,300 combat hours in Vietnam and has the bullet hole patches to prove it.
The single-engine helicopter was a workhouse, widely used for medical evacuation missions (medevac) and moving troops quickly from one landing zone to another. She was among 7,000 UH-1 helicopters deployed during the war. The 1966 Huey served in Vietnam from 1968 through 1970.
Lake hopes reuniting with the iconic Huey will help vets remember those stories, good and bad, and eventually lead to some level of healing for them. “The stories may be buried, but the emotions are always filtering up.” Everybody said, ‘Get out of your uniforms, get into civilians,’ because the population in America at the time took out their angst about the Vietnam War on the troops,” Lake said. “Remember that when Vietnam vets came home, we were told, don’t tell your stories. Lake said she has witnessed the powerful emotions and connection vets feel when they touch or sit in the 823. PTSD therapist and Vietnam veteran Alexis Lake volunteers her time with Liberty War Birds and also serves as the vice president of maintenance. It’s not going to be a static display, we’re going to get it flying again,” Haga said. “Right now what we’re doing is restoring a Vietnam veteran UH-1H helicopter to flight status. It’s just fun.”īut Haga said he and his volunteers are doing more than just fixing up 823’s paint. “So when you can get to work on one of these things it’s neat. “It’s like a kid with a big train set,” said volunteer Steve Rosinski, who served as a crew chief in a Huey in Vietnam. The majority of those volunteers are Vietnam War vets. Since Liberty War Birds acquired Huey 823, as she’s called, about a dozen dedicated volunteers come to a hangar at the Lancaster Airport every weekend to rebuild her. The first two numbers indicate when the helicopter was built, 1966.
HUEY HELICOPTER VIETNAM WAR SERIAL NUMBER
The aircraft’s serial number was 66-16823. Two years ago, the nonprofit scraped together $250,000 in donations to buy a Huey. “We didn’t change planes too often, unless they’re a heap of a pile of nothing…and this was in pretty good shape.WHYY thanks our sponsors - become a WHYY sponsor
“I was there for like six months, so if it was there, I flew it,” he recalled. It was on his second tour, which included time with the 118th Assault Helicopter Company, that Patterson was wounded in his leg.
Patterson served two tours of duty in Vietnam for a total of 19 months. “Then, I said ‘I was in that company’ and I looked at the tail and there it was.” Patterson recognized the Huey’s tail number as the one he flew in Vietnam. “I read it and it said it came from the 118th aviation company,” Patterson told Reston Now. During that time, it flew with four units: Company A, 229th Aviation Battalion, 1st Cavalry Division Headquarters Company, 11th Aviation Battalion the 128th Assault Helicopter Company and the 118th Assault Helicopter Company. Their UH-1 flew in Vietnam from 1966 to 1970. The museum displays the Huey with information detailing the aircraft’s history. The Huey allowed American forces to traverse Vietnam’s mountainous terrain (U.S.