DOOR GUNNER
Monsoon rain swept Kanga Pad in a gunmetal grey rolling wave, the sort of deluge which soaks a person from the ground up as it bounces off the surface.

My door gunner, John Fitzpatrick better known as 'Fitzy' and myself sat huddled in front of the rotor transmission wall and away from the open doors of the 9SQN Iroquois designated callsign Albatross 04. A Yank Chinook taxied up to the POL (petrol, oils & lubricants) and the 'crewies' jumped out to start refuelling, flight suits and flak jackets soaked through in seconds. Fitzy and I grinned at each other maliciously, the only time it got cold in Vietnam was at 1000 feet doing 150 knots soaked with the doors off the Aircraft

. SQN LDR Brian Nichols (father of Victoria Nichols, just a tacker in those days) lounged in the captain's seat flicking through a month old Canberra Times while co-pilot P/O Stu Dalgleish updated his artillery references. We were tasked to fly a captured North Vietnamese Major to the ARVN POW camp at Baria for further 'Questioning' Yeah, we all knew what that meant in South Vietnamese parlance. The staccato tap of the turbine igniters heralded the arrival of Landrover .The rotors where already turning as the slight figure in black was led to the aircraft. Blind folded and with his hands tied behind his back, he was lifted into the aircraft and sat down between the pilot's seats facing us. An Aussie G2 (intelligence) leaned across to Fitzy yelling over the rotor and turbine noise "Keep your pistol aimed at him for the whole time you are in the air." Fitzy, with a whole thirteen hours of flight time as a door gunner nodded and dutifully pulled out his 9mm Browning aiming it at the prisoner.

We became airborne out of Nui Dat following Route 1 low level in the rainsqualls, I reached across and pulled the blind fold away from the POW's eyes lit two smokes and stuck one between his lips. The captured Major grinned with gratitude and inhaled deeply. He was tall for his race with a strong young face. I could see he was resigned to the fact that he would be soon in far less gentle hands than the Aussies and I had determined that his memory of us would not be one of inhumanness. Fitzy still had his pistol aimed somewhere in the direction of the man. The thought crossed my mind that, if he pulled the trigger he would probably hit the boss, the bullet would ricochet into Stu, we would crash, and the prisoner would escape anyway, because I don't think Fitzy could have hit a barn door.

The thump of the rotors deepened as we began the descent into the Baria compound. I pulled the smoke from between the Majors lips and flicked it out of the door as we flared for landing, the engine was reduced to flight idle as we waited for the welcoming committee. Slowly the POW leaned toward me and in the best Cambridge English said.

" You really ought to tell your gunner that if he points his pistol at someone, there should be a magazine in it."

Sure enough the butt of Fitzy's pistol was empty.

It took a long time for RAAF Airfield Defence Guard cum 9SQN Air Gunner John Fitzpatrick to live that one down.
Supplied by ALAN JONES

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