I'm ALIVE!!!!! My. . .name. . . is. . .Dan

I want to tell you all that I have agonized over how I wanted to present this story that happened to me while I was stationed at Clark Air Base in the Philippines.  Only a few of my very close family and friends know of this story.  This does not include the Army shrinks who I saw soon after this happened.  This is the first time that I have written about it.

Let me start off by telling you that I met Dan in early 1966.  But before I tell you all about Dan and myself, let me set up the background for how I met him.. . . .

As I said earlier when I filled out my 'dream sheet' before leaving AIT at Fort Devens, I had put down for my three choices 1) Vietnam, 2) Vietnam and 3) Vietnam.  That is why I ended up in the Philippines.  I must give the U.S. Government and the U.S. Army credit, they put me in the same operation theater, South-East Asia.

After serving in the Philippines for a while, I got to the point where I put in for an inter-theater transfer to Vietnam.  It was turned down on three consecutive occasions.  So, what could I do to be more involved with the war going on in Vietnam?  I was visiting the wounded vets returning to the hospital at Clark for medical treatments.  This, I felt, was still not enough.  So as I was visiting the cafeteria at Base Ops one day, looking out on the flight line, it became clear to me what I had to do. I got straight up from my coffee and went into Base Ops and volunteered for Midi Vac duty.  What we would do would be to supervise and help unload planes bringing back the war wounded.  After about two days I learned about medivacs coming out of Vietnam.

In time of war, you don't know how much of a target is presented to the enemy (Charlie) by painting a big Red Cross on a plane.  It's like saying, "You can't shoot  at me because I have a Red Cross on this plane".  It just makes an aiming point for Charlie.  Most of the time, we would get the planes in from Tan Son Nhut Air Base or Da Nang Air Base.  You could look at the planes coming in and tell if it had taken off from a "Hot LZ" (Landing Zone).  Hot, meaning that the plane was taking incoming mortar or small arms fire as it was taking off.  If the plane had peaces missing or bullet holes in in, it was considered a "Hot" This basis made the inside of the cargo hold of the plane completely different.

When a plane is normally bringing back wounded, without a 'hot LZ", the first to be loaded into the plane is the dead.  Those in body bags.  They would be stacked toward the front of the plane in a neat and orderly fashion. Next in would go the stretcher cases, those on stretchers, the last on would be the ambulatory or walking wounded.  A "Hot" plane, the body bags were put on in a hurry, scattered about because of the need to get off the ground and out of range of mortars and gunfire as quick as possible.  The stretchers and the ambulatory would be all mixed up.

A typical unloading would be that the arriving plane would lower the ramp, the ambulatory would walk of with any assistance they would need, be taken to the doctors, nurses and medics set up on the flight line to care for them.  The ones who did not need immediate care were helped into ambulances and sent to the hospital.  Then we would walk up the ramp and take the stretcher cases and bring them out to the medical line set up there.  Then we would pair up, and remove the body bags.  They were placed in ambulances and taken to the morgue at the base hospital for identification.

The day that I met Dan, the plane had come in from Da Nang and it had been 'hot' at take off.  When the ramp came down, everything inside had been thoroughly mixed up.  We had to go up and help all of the ambulatory and stretchers get separated.  After that part was done, then came the nightmare.  The body bags were scattered all over the place.  Some of the bags were not even zipped up.  There were extra arms and legs laying around.  We would place the arms or legs on the closest body bag to it.

Like I said, we did this in twos, one for the foot of the bag, the other to the head.  We had gone down about three or four layers and came to this one bag.  I was at the head, the bag was not closed, and an arm was hanging out of the bag.  As I was reaching to place the hand and arm back into the bag and close it, my friend who was at the foot, said something to me.  I didn't understand what he said, so I stopped, looked up at him and asked him what he had said.  As I was looking up from the body bag, to my friend, this hand latched onto my wrist with a vice like grip.  I was in complete shock.  I thought I was going completely nuts. Talking about a nightmare in the daytime.  No words describe the filling I was going through.  My first instinct was to open the bag and get the arm back inside.  When I opened the bag completely off the head, there was blood everywhere, but the eyes were looking directly at me.  His lips were moving but I could not believe what my eyes and ears were telling me.  I leaned over and I could barely make out what he was saying, "I;m alive. . . my . . .name . . is . . Dan . . ." Then he passed out.  I started screaming, "Medic. Medic, Medic. . .we have a live one here. . .please help him....

I had to go with him and the doctors because they could not get his grip on my wrist off until they had given him some muscle relaxant.  Even with that, they had to pry the fingers loose.  Needless to say, I was in complete shock.  I was a nervous wreck, just waiting for a place to come down.

Two days later I went to the base hospital and see what had happened to Dan.  I was told by the nurse that they did not have a Dan there with the wounded, but they had three 'John Does" that  were there and no one knew their names.  She took me to them, after the first two, I was ready to quit, but when I saw the last one, I told the nurse, "This is Dan" but, I don't know what his last name was or which branch of the service he was in.  Dan was still in a coma, but I still went to see him every day.  About a week later, they listed him as Daniel Jackson, USMC.  After another week of visiting Dan everyday, I went in one afternoon and his bed was empty.  I ask the nurse about it and she said he still had not come out of the coma, but the doctors had decided that he would get better treatment at Walter Reed Hospital, so they hod placed him on a plane with a couple of doctors and nurses and sent him to Andrews in Washington, DC.  I never did find out about what ever happened to Dan,

To this very day, and everyday without fail, I think about Dan.

Well my friends, it's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life. . . .

Til next posting....God speed!