long binh ammo dump explosion 1968

As we made the turn eastward on Highway 1, the lead platoon was ambushed. probably one of the best deals I had been Used for because the Then things started falling out of the sky. Script is copyright Reuters Limited. A great deal has been written about the battles of Tet 1968 and the political firestorm that resulted from them. The 2nd Platoon, under Lieutenant Fred Casper, led the way, followed by my track, then Lieutenant Howard Jones 1st Platoon and, finally, the weapons platoon under Lieutenant Don Muir. Charlie Company soldiers, used to months of patrolling and fighting in the jungles, suddenly found themselves fighting house to house as their fathers had done in World War II. Flames consuming huts. more because Mankato (Minnesota)Vocational school had taught me to weld as 11K views 9 years ago This is a brief clip of the ammo dump explosion at Long Binh, Vietnam, taken the morning of the Tet offensive, 1968. He waved me off. As we rolled by, we looked down into the compound and saw soldiers in khakis milling about with boarding passes in hand. An accurate body count could never be compiled since so many VC bodies were dragged away or were burned in the many fires that ravaged the towns and villages. USAF (United States Air Force) F-100 Super Sabre jet fighter aircraft drops Mark 82 (Mk.82) high-drag (HD) bombs. No answer. As we turned right onto Highway 15, an unbelievable spectacle stretched before us. [2]:347[3]:236 The rocket/mortar attack was the signal to start the ground assaults on Bien Hoa AB and Long Binh. secondary explosions. Since I was in an airborne unit, I was sure I would go to the 173rd Airborne Brigade or the 101st Airborne Division. At 03:45 the unit engaged the VC/PAVN with 2 ACAVs being quickly knocked out by RPG fire. (Vietnam War period). Kortuem! I was to be a platoon leader again, in Charlie Company, commanded by Captain John Ionoff. To ensure you can use all the features please enable it. bore in my M14 barrel had begun to flake off and the wooden stock was Now commanded by a brand-new second lieutenant, the men of Alpha Company balked when they were told to move. [4], The 179th Military Intelligence Detachment of the 199th LIB had been gathering intelligence on a pending attack on Long Binh for several weeks before the attacks based on human intelligence and ground radar. Set. VC informants inside the base had provided detailed information as to the base layout and defenses. forever the big pieces stopped. He [2]:347, The ARVN 53rd Regional Force Battalion was responsible for security in the countryside around Bin Ha. We charged southeast down Highway 316 to the Highway 15 intersection, located on a small hill overlooking the 90th Replacement Company. I EXPLOSIONS IN DISTANCE The ammunition dump contained high explosives like: C-4, artillery rounds, mortar rounds, aerial flares, 50 caliber rounds, M-60 machine gun rounds, and aerial rockets for the Huey Cobra and gunships. As the 2nd Platoon began to run short, Spc. In addition, we were tremendously flexible. LV EXPLOSION, SIGN ON BOARD "DISNEY LAND FAR EAST" Our arrival had canceled fears that III Corps headquarters might be overrun. Now commanded by a brand-new second lieutenant, the men of Alpha Company balked when they were told to move. Then I got a call from battalion commander Tower, asking how things were going. The progress was slow and ammo was becoming scarce, particularly grenades, which get consumed at an enormous rate in city fighting. We topped off our fuel tanks, replenished our ammo and continued to move toward our assigned blocking position. As we fought our way toward the scout platoon, we were blocked by two large churches that were directly across Highway 1 from each other, both occupied by the VC. At 7 a.m., as daylight was breaking, my track rolled past the ARVN III Corps compound gate. Now Since I was in an airborne unit, it seemed certain that I would go to the 173rd Airborne Brigade or the 101st Airborne Division. The chrome Tower sent Major Jones to take command, and once Alpha got moving, it did a magnificent job. It dawned on us that the VC were throwing down their weapons, changing clothes and slipping away. The Vietnamese general and the III Corps G3 adviser, however, were not very happy when we pulled out. As we made the turn eastward on Highway 1, the lead platoon was ambushed. License Agreement | PAVN/VC losses were 137 killed and 25 captured. Jan. 31. 12. After we finished clearing the area around the compound and as our wounded were being dusted off, I received an absolutely incredible order from III Corps. I told the platoon leaders to prepare to dismount and to take all the ammunition and grenades they could carry. Just then a three-man VC RPG team calmly walked across the street right in front of the damaged APC. Now someone pointed out that there were a lot of young men, all dressed in black pants and white shirts, among the refugees. Hide. As I walked around the front of a track, the .50-caliber gunner accidentally hit the trigger and pumped five rounds into the ground about three feet in front of me. During this fighting, both platoon leaders were wounded, Lieutenant Casper in the leg and Lieutenant Jones in the foot. Then, for the last week in January, the 2-47 was sent south of the 9th Divisions base camp to patrol the jungles east of Highway 15, near the Binh Son rubber plantation. Wrecked ambulance with flat tires. He said the first thing he could remember was the The Long Binh ammunition dump had exploded. A spokesman for the South Vietnamese command said that, according to unconfirmed re ports, satchel charges, of the type used by Vietcong sabotage squads were found near the dump. Meanwhile, Hueys reported VC running from the village. My plan was to make captain and go to Vietnam as an experienced company commander. Bravo Company was sent to protect the Long Binh ammunition dump and Charlie Company was ordered into downtown Bien Hoa, where the ARVN III Corps headquarters was in danger of being overrun. On January 23, during a battalion sweep of a heavily jungled area south of Highway 1, Alpha Company walked into a well-camouflaged, well-defended enemy bunker system and was badly mauled, losing four men killed and more than 20 wounded, including almost all of the officers. The first explosion was 2,400,000 pounds of 8 inch high explosive artillery projectiles. This fire was observed by the helicopter gunships that had been circling the area north of Long Binh and they quickly moved to attack the launch sites and were soon joined by an AC-47 Spooky gunship and their combined fire soon stopped the rocket/mortar fire. We came up with a T formation. Simultaneously, platoon leaders reported finding discarded AK-47s. Realizing we were driving past our objective, I halted the company and called for the 2nd Platoon to find a place to turn around. We closed within a few hundred meters of the scout platoon and watched as helicopter gunships destroyed a large yellow house from which the VC were pinning down Barnes troops. The Long Binh ammo dump had exploded. After the cemetery had been cleared Company B, 2/3rd Infantry joined Company C, 4/12th Infantry and they made a night defensive perimeter north of Ho Nai, while the 2/47th Infantry was withdrawn to Bin Ha. We could shoot about 21 miles into Cambodia. We could haul more personal gear, live more comfortably and walk less than straight-leg troops. I said again, "Who is there"? [7], The Tet offensive attacks and previous losses due to mortar and rocket attacks on air bases across South Vietnam led the Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Nitze on 6 March 1968 to approve the construction of 165 "Wonderarch" roofed aircraft shelters at the major air bases. When I arrived at the 2nd Battalion (Mechanized), 47th Infantry, nicknamed the Panthers, Lt. Col. Arthur Moreland, the commander, asked me what job I wanted. After all had left for the In command for five months, I had been assured that I would be leading the company for one year, which suited me fine. The first explosion was This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. STOCKPILES OF BOMBS AND ARTILLERY SHELLS AT THE U.S. ARMY AMMUNITION DUMP AT LONG BINH, IN SOUTH VIETNAM, ERUPTED YESTERDAY (SATURDAY) WHEN TIME CHARGES, PLACED BY VIET CONG RAIDERS, DETONATED AMID TONS OF HIGH EXPLOSIVES. We rolled through Long Binh and out the main gate, then turned onto Highway 316. Listening to the scouts desperate fight on the radio, Charlie Company attacked with renewed vigor as we tried to get to Barnes and his men. The progress was slow and ammunition was becoming a scarce, particularly grenades, which city fighting consumes at an enormous rate. All of these placements were made with the wrongful assumption that the VC would attack from the jungles outside the base. The VC who had fired the RPG slipped away, but Pfc Jim Love, who was tossed into a sewage ditch by the explosion, remembers killing the jeep with his M-16. Painting outside. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.. I told him about the order to clear an area of operations equal in size to that assigned the airborne battalion. Charlie Company quickly reinforced Alpha, and a daylong fight ensued. Long Binh ammo dump was one of the biggest ordnance storage areas in the country. Satchel charges blew pallets of artillery ammunition, creating a mushroom cloud that made us think the VC had set off a tactical nuclear weapon. I have . Love was so startled, he didnt fire. When it went off my first thought was that it was a nuclear explosion because of the light dome that rose from the explosion. When offered the chance to go to II Field Force to help establish a new long-range reconnaissance patrol outfit, I turned it down to stay with the company. around Bien Hoa Airbase and headed toward our post of Long Binh, then Come back up on the battalion freq. I had never been so happy in my life. Somehow the foam trucks from We could use our tracks as a base of fire or in a blocking position as the company maneuvered on foot. [3]:2289, The Tt ceasefire began on 29 January, but was cancelled on 30 January after the VC/PAVN prematurely launched attacks in II Corps and at 17:30 the 7th Air Force commander General William W. Momyer ordered all air bases in South Vietnam to security condition red. As the scouts escaped, the volume of enemy fire began to slacken, then died altogether. When it As the sun sank over the Long Binh base, they tossed a football and ate cold C rations. About two days later one the huge fuel bags next On January 23, during a battalion sweep through heavy jungle south of Highway 1, Alpha Company walked into a camouflaged, well-defended enemy bunker system and was badly mauled. Incredibly, nobody in my company had been killed the day before. The VC attacks on Bien Hoa and the Long Binh complex were abject failures, due in part to the fact that on January 31, 1968, they had run into the Panthers of the 2nd Battalion (Mechanized), 47th Infantry. This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the United States Army Center of Military History. while we were gone. The 2-47s enemy body count came in at over 200, while the battalion suffered only four KIA. Later, as the sun sank over the Long Binh base, they tossed a football and ate cold C rations. I told him we couldnt take the tracks off Highway 1 into town because the streets were too narrow. At the time of the For more great articles be sure to subscribe to Vietnam Magazine today!