This Day in History: 1967-11-19

The first RAN Iriquois helicopter of the joint RAN / US Army Experimental Military Unit (EMU) to be shot down (and the first with an Australian pilot to be hit) was a gunship piloted by Lieutenant Anthony Casadio, RAN, on 19 November 1967, during an attack on Viet Cong positions in the Rung Sat Special Zone near Saigon. After his gunship was hit by ground fire several times, Lieutenant Casadio force-landed near the enemy. Once on the ground the Viet Cong immediately attacked the helicopter crew. Despite their relative inexperience, the young American soldiers and their Australian Navy captain maintained control of the situation and set up a defensive perimeter using the helicopter’s door mounted M60 machine guns. The M60s combined with the small arms they all carried afforded the crew a degree of self-protection. Meanwhile Lieutenant John Leek, RAN, in an accompanying gunship circled overhead until his fuel ran dangerously low and he was forced to leave the scene. Before Lieutenant Casadio and his men were rescued by another EMU helicopter, they successfully drove off an unknown number of Viet Cong, killing two of the enemy in the process. A Chinook helicopter later lifted the downed helicopter from the crash site and recovered it back to Vung Tau. Source: www.navy.gov.au/ran-helicopter-flight-vietnam-history website