---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Donald Jones
Date: Feb 4, 2007 2:45 PM
Subject: Info
To: webmaster@popasmoke.com

To Whom it may concern,

I'm looking for the names of the pilots for the following shootdown;

Marine Corps CH-53 helicopter 156658 was shot down on 11Jul1972 during Operation Lam Son II. The pilot, co-pilot, and passengers escaped with injuries but the bodies of crewmen SSG Jerry Wayne Hendrix of Wichita, Kansas and CPL Kenneth Lloyd Crody of Griffith, Indiana were not recovered until 2000 and positively identified 4/2004. Both men were assigned to HMM-165, MAG-36, 1ST MAW

I served with the ONLY non crew survivor Cpl Steve Lively. I am trying to contact him and the remaining two crewmembers. He was with 1/9. I am trying to locate him through them as well.

Here's Steve first hand anecdotal account (without the normal language
associated);

The aircraft was massively overloaded. They were taken down in a volly of SAM's. He said that one of the door gunners was killed when a broken turbine blade hit him in the chest. Most of the ARVN's died in the engine and missile explosion...not as a result of the post crash fire (which remembering the photo) was not THAT bad... most of the aircraft was intact. He said that prior to impact the aircraft commander (a major?) was yelling that he couldn't see because of the smoke in the cockpit. The right seater told him to "let him have it" and they flared late in a really shallow decent, impacted, and turned over on it's left side. While everyone was trying to egress...the AC accidentally inflated his maywest and became wedged in the overhead exit (now, after the crash, the exit was almost on the ground). Steve chuckled when he told me that he felt he got his Silver Star for what he did next. He said he held on to the copilot's seat swung up and booted the Major in the ass with both feet, forcing him out onto the ground.They then made for a dike, about 75 meters to the aft of the aircraft. In his possession was his camera and his side arm. I don't believe that any of them actually had a rifle.

According to your KIA incident page:
https://www.popasmoke.com/kia/incidents.php?incident_id=14&conflict_id=24

"The pilot was Capt. Erickson. The co-pilot was Capt. Bowman, a former F-4 pilot."

Any idea if they are members of the Association?

Best Regards and Semper Fi

Don Jones
Fort Worth, Texas
lopull@airmail.net