Fairchild AC-119 — Vietnam’s Accidental Gunship

[Mike H.]

Hello all, here is today's article posted on TheArmoryLife.com. It is titled “Fairchild AC-119 — Vietnam’s Accidental Gunship” and can be found at https://www.thearmorylife.com/fairchild-ac-119/.

 

[Greg46]

Glad to see info on AC119G and K.

 

[rcurtner]

Very good read.

 

[USMC6094]

The 119 took the early lessons learned from the AC-47 to heart, the 119 was a nearly planetary shift from the Dakota, more payload and better range, not to mention the sensor suite it could take on.
The 47 needed flare ships, the Boxcar didn't........

 

[GaCop]

Never got to see any of the Box Car gun ships, I left SEA in December 67.

 

[Randall Wilson]

Another great article, Doc. I had no idea these were deployed. The Spectres get all the coverage.

Randall

 

[Icepick Mike]

When I was on the Long Dong Valley trip only the C47 Puff was running CAS. But I did jump from the C119 when I went to Jump School at Ft Benning. Guess that dates me pretty much as an old geezer. Later on in my life adventure I did have access to and used Specter on a few occasions. Life was grand and exciting then, still is!

 

[Icepick Mike]

Never got to see any of the Box Car gun ships, I left SEA in December 67.

Same same here GI

 

[Tinyman]

They had a few of them at Udorn Thailand. Mighty airframes and sturdy as well. One night while I was riding with a friend in the EOD Jeep, the radio call sounded like this -- (pardon, but this was in 1970 and the mind isn't as sharp as it should be) "Udorn tower, Spooky XXX declaring an IFE (Inflight Emergency) -- we have taken massive ground fire, and the controls are very sluggish". They then transmitted souls-on-board and the rest of the needed information. From what I overheard, jettisoned everything to lighten the load (mountains to fly over). Brought it in, landed and taxied to its parking area. Just as it stopped, a crew member jumped out and due to the sluggish controls, shined his flashlight under the wing to see if he could see the damage. He only saw SOME of the damage -- 18 1/2 feet of the left wing was gone.

Not sure if any medals were given out but if not, they should have.

 

[Talyn]

C-119 "Packet" / "Flying Boxcar"/ USN / USMC Fairchlid R4Q Naval Fighters 117 — David Doyle Books

In 1949 the US Navy was looking for a tactical assault transport for its Marine Corps units and arrangements were made to divert 8 off the shelf C-119Bs from the USAF to the USMC. These 8 aircraft and the 31 C-119Cs that followed were designated R4Q-1s. A small number of these R4Q-1s were operated i

daviddoylebooks.com

 

[BassCliff]

Hi,

When I was on the Long Dong Valley trip only the C47 Puff was running CAS. But I did jump from the C119 when I went to Jump School at Ft Benning. Guess that dates me pretty much as an old geezer. Later on in my life adventure I did have access to and used Specter on a few occasions. Life was grand and exciting then, still is!

Wow. Much respect to you, sir.


Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff