You might want to talk to Jim May as he was Doc Geliens' Crew Chief that night . As the story goes that a flip of a coin let Doc sleep aboard the Medivac chopper and Jim got the Line shack bunk. Sorry to say I have lost Jims E-mail Address .Your Uncle was a well respected Corpman and we were proud to have served with him. Kind Regards and Semper Fi Marc Czomba //

GunnerM79@aol.com

FYI

MAY JAMES F 1302 9TH ST LAKE CHARLES LA 70601 318-439-2895 VMO-2 VMO-2

Walt Gelien

I knew Chief Gelien very well. We were both in 1st Marine Brigade at Kaneohe. Then we went to Futema, Okinawa. He and I went through Special Forces Jump School at Sukiran together. I still have copies of the orders for us to go to Jump School. After Jump School we went to Iwakuni. I also have copies of the orders for us to go from Futema to Iwakuni. We stayed in Iwakuni for a couple of months and then went "south". We arrived in Da Nang on 12 Sep 65 about the time Operation Starlight was winding up. We were both assigned to VMO-2 and I was with him until he was killed. I will look through all my pictures and slides to see if I can find any of Chief Gelien-- this will take me awhile to do as they aren't well organized. I haven't looked at any of those pictures in at least 30 years. He was a great guy and it made me very sad when he got killed. He was the first of my friends to get killed in Vietnam. Please let me know if you would like to have copies of the orders with his name on them.

Semper Fi,
Jerry Griffin HMCM, USN (Ret)
Beaumont, TX
409-898-7244