cooling off your critics
Carrying a heavy load into a confined area in triple canopy jungle, I touched down on about a 14-15 deg slope and sat there while the grunts, gunner and crewman off-loaded the cardboard boxes and stacked them on the upslope side, just outside the rotor disc. They were boxes of C4 plastique used by the troops to blow (implode) CS irrit-gas into an enemy base-camp bunker system so that it would not be re-occupied; a fairly stock-standard practise. I handed over to Marty, the other pilot, for the ride back to the fire support base. He and I were both just starting to get a bit interested in why the UH-1H collective was up so far yet the aircraft wasn't lifting, when the downslope skid broke free from under a root and we started rolling rapidly into the hill-side. Marty and I both slammed the collective into the floor and off we went bouncing sideways down the slope into the underbrush. At the same time I heard a torrent of abuse start over the radio but was far too busy to concentrate on what was being said. We eventually ground to a halt in the undergrowth and looked back up the hill. The rotor had taken the top layer of C4 boxes and slammed them off the pile and there were packets of plastique scattered all over the pad. The grunts had fled to the four winds and a grim-looking Major was striding down the hill abusing us on his radio as he came. Marty and I looked at each other and, in unison, pulled pitch and we shot through.
Late that same afternoon we returned, unfortunately with the same callsign, and tried the same 150ft vertical into the same LZ. We had a full load of 5 gal jerry-cans of water on board. However, as luck would have it, we'd spent the rest of the day in and out of a burnt LZ and picked up lots of ash. The best we could get out of it, fully beeped up, was about 38psi torque (>52 being an overtorque on the L-13). Each night the aircraft were given a bucketful of walnut shells to clean the compressor and recover the power but, at the time, late in every day we had to make do with what we had. Things were looking good until we dropped below the jungle canopy and lost the 12kt headwind. After that we were going down fast with bleeding rotor and audio RPM warning flashing. Luckily the back end crew were on the ball and started kicking the jerrycans. Just as the first ones cleared the aircraft the same company Major started up his torrent of abuse over the radio. However strangely, as quickly as he started, he stopped. After getting rid of half the load the problem was resolved but the crewmen were enjoying themselves and ended up kicking the lot. As we pulled out, deciding to leave the backload for the next day's logistic support crew, the gunner piped up with: "Bulls-eye, that shut him up quick didn't it".
We later heard that the Major wasn't a happy chappie at all. About two weeks later the Intello came and grabbed us and told us that there was a Major who'd just come off ops looking for us both by name. Name-tags came off helmets and flight suit right quick and next day we were Smith and Jones. Some people just have no sense of humour.