Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Most dangerous thing/sport you ever did?

Here I am flying my Goldwing ultralight. I built this from a kit, foam and fiberglass construction. This thing was so much fun.
I kept it in a cow pasture near my house. One day I went down to fly, and the tank had only 1 1/2 gallons of gas. I decided to see how far that would carry me.
I took off, and flew in 1/2 mile wide circles at maximum climb rate. Got up to 6,200 feet above the hard red Georgia clay, the engine sputtered and conked out.
It was so quiet it was really beautiful.
I circled back down to my field and landed dead stick. Took 14 minutes to glide back to earth.

Flying as an observer in a Wire Environment!! Its scary how the angle of sunlight can make a 500 KV line disappear.

I flew a lot of miles as an aerial observer doing waterfowl surveys, between 150 and 400 ft AGL in single and twin engine fixed wing aircraft. can be risky at times. lost a great friend to that type of work due to a power line over the Columbia River.

Thanksgiving dinner with a bunch of democRAT relatives...

I'm proud of myself.. I didn't kill anyone...

other than that... playing Army for 6 years...on helo Med Evac crew for 2 of those...

Fun times when it was going on....years afterwards, ya realize the risks that you were taking...

some other crazy youthful stuff...that it wouldn't be politically correct to talk about nowadays...
at night, in and around Metro DC.. we got shot at, at times...

Evening, mini bikes, go carts,Horses, cattle, pigs, (ya try & ride a pig sometime) no not those kind. bikes, snowmobiles, high diving of bridges always into water, 4 concussions, slow Learner!!!!! Ok now kkkk now. The real men are our soldiers, Un PHugin Believable!!!!!!!!!! I think because they all Risked Life & Limb they should be paid retirement as soon as they come back, forever!!!!!! Bill out. 🐾👣🇨🇦

OK, one day of my life a few years back. This is a chapter from "Roll of the Dice".

Chapter 16: Sport in the Rolling Hills

Like the old war melody says, "Down collective, pedal right, hope I am alive tonight...spin, crash and burn!"(to the tune of Bye Bye blackbird)........

I always had that thought whilst plying my trade as one of Nixon's Hired Guns. Always wondered who coined those lyrics too. Anyway, When I flew Scouts with the various Cav units across the minor length and breadth of S. Vietnam, we flew as hunter-killer teams, which is another misnomer because the Cobra Guns did the killing for the most part, I was just bait. Those sick bastids in their air conditioned Snakes would joke about reeling Scouts up every once in awhile to see if they'd had any nibbles...

I was out in the A Shau Valley one day, only a few klicks from Hamburger Hill(Dong Ap Bia) with a heavy pink team, doing a visual recon east of THE HILL, and south of Tiger Mountain, a flat top massif that always appeared ominous to me. I never flew over it once in 2.5 years. Boogie Men lived there! We flew out at altitude and once in the general area I made a brief look-see for obvious signs of the enemy, like flak, or formations doing close order drill, then hummed my opening line as I started descent in a typically erratic spiral. No, not a Death Spiral, an erratic spiral. Yes, they look alike, that's the idea. The Dead Man Zone for small arms fire against choppers lies between 100' and 1500' AGL, the less time spent there the better.

As the rolling hills rushed up I added power, rolled back to the left, and began ferreting out the small game. Low, slow, cock-eyed out of trim, three shades hotter than Hades, and the smell of green. It was my world. My crewman, a Spec. 4 serving as an armed observer sat beside me in the left seat, M16 laying across his lap, red smoke grenade in his hand that was to be tossed in the event we took fire. That was a highly likely prospect out in the Valley.

Over the river and thru the dale, to Uncle Ho's Hoards we flew! Up a hill, negative G push to keep the altitude down, transmission pressure light glowing red as it always did when the oil floated in the casing during those maneuvers. Turn left, turn right, up the hill! They were all covered with scattered scrubby trees and lots of elephant grass, which can reach 12' in height and is a wonderful world for hiding things from people like me. Things like 12.7mm guns for one. Whoops! there goes one out the right side, well, not a gun, but the pit they build for them with the little bunker on one side. Freshly dug I might add.

The little vermin are sneaky bastids, I give them that. They found out early on that a flight of two Cobras could pretty much tap dance all over one of their 12.7mm positions and never even worry about it. Soooo, they started grouping them in twos and threes. "Okay', sez I, 'Hey Mr. Guns, there's a .50 pit 5 o,clock and 100 meters or so, fresh.' In our way, we called that gathering intel back then. Problem was they never deployed just one in the A Shau Valley. They had stuff they were proud of, and liked to take pot shots at interlopers. So, if one was on 'Hill A", there was likely to be another on "Hill B". Usually within a couple of hundred meters, terrain permitting, and also at the same elevation. This tactic permits "Mutually supportive fire", and changes the equation greatly in regards to the Cobras. It takes 3 Snakes to deal with 2 guns. I had two Snakes.

Low stayed, slow was out the window. 80-100 knots(that's faster than a buzzard) now, down the hill, up the hill, and about 250 meters away there lies a freshly dug pit for another 12.7mm. Entrenching tool still laying on the bottom of the pit. Whoops again, call the lead Snake and babble about stock picks, real estate, and cat hunting for a few seconds while I think "Whoa" to my trusty steed and get it turned around for another quick pass back to Hill A. Much to my chagrin as I fly over Hill B, the entrenching tool is gone, and I reported that before telling them that there was now a tripod set up at Hill A and my stuff is getting decidedly weak. Yes, Cobras can duke it out with .50's, the LOH cannot, and .50's will chew a new anal orifice in a chopper...chop chop!

As I went over the position I broke left toward Tiger Mountain and the guns rolled in on Hill A. A tactically awkward situation for me as they were my cover and life line, yet the gun had to be hammered, pure and simple. I knew full well that Hill B probably was set up or very close to it, I was pinned between the Snake's GT line and the mountain, the only path out being over Hill B. Yuckee-poo. The good news was that I had a brand new, never been fired GE Mini-gun hangin' on the left side, and a full load of ammo. I was also below their line of sight for the moment. Any attempt to climb to altitude would have put me in their sights sure as sunrise and voided any advantage I held at the moment. To paraphrase the old Indian saying, 'It was a good day to wet your pants'. I had long since learned that the best defense is truly a good offense, and since I was in the Cav, and certifiably insane since I'd volunteered for this crap, I did the only thing I could do. Charge! I have a long history of being offensive.

Not only can choppers do what planes do, they can do more. And less. A lot of less. Their advantage is that you can literally drag your skids through the grass and even at a leisurely 120 knots you go by pretty quick to a ground based observation. We were almost up to that speed when Hill B reared up a couple of hundred feet above us, a saddle on either side that blocked earthbound view of low level ingress. I used one of those "little less" tricks, called a cyclic climb, or simply pulling back on the stick to trade speed for altitude. Zoom Zoom! The Mini-gun on the LOH was flexible in elevation only, azimuth controlled with the foot pedals, and in the circumstance I'd fully depressed it as I expected to be looking at them through the chin bubble when they came into view. Further, I planed to go negative over the top and hopefully keep the gun on target until nearly overhead at which point I woud dive once again for the safety of lower elevations. Up the hill! Time for one of those famous "time standing still" moments.

The gunner was waiting, his azimuth about 20* off to my left, the other varmint was crouched low with an ammo can at the ready. He fired as he began to swing the gun, and as I replied.

Couple of points on this: 1) The 12.7 has a cyclic rate of fire in the range of 500-700 rounds per minute, it also has a huge hour glass shaped muzzle flash, visible even on bright sunny days. One in five rounds is a tracer, and if anyone asks what they look like, just give 'em your best steely eyed stare and say "basketballs". Big round red basketballs. Every time one goes by you hear a deep sonic crack, then you get 4 more audibles before the next light show. It is REALLY impressive. Tracers don't seem to move really fast when they are heading right at you BTW. At least not until they go past, ZIP-CRACK! They do not go "whoosh" or "whiz" like in the movies. 2) Mini-guns in US Army versions, have a selective fire rate of 2000 or 4000 RPM. At that time they were noted for jamming often when fired at 2000rpm, so that mode was seldom used. Both rates had a 3 second burst limiter, meaning that you got to shoot for 3 seconds, then your water hose shut down. Again, 1 in 5 was a tracer, crackety-crack, I'm sure it looked impressive from the wrong end too, but I never saw that. Effective range was touted at 1100 meters, mostly because the splash of bullets was visible at that range.

Up close they churn the earth, creating a rooster tail effect of earth as the rounds sought their target, usually a serpentine path of mauled dirt, trees, whatever got in it's way. Inside of 100 yards it is impossible to shoot somebody less that 6 times with one that is on low rate fire. God, what a beast!

My first rounds impacted about 20 yards low and left, a bit of back pressure on the stick, a bit of right pedal, and the dirt dragon began it's journey to the pit. Range at this point was about 60 meters. It was the OK Corral. High Noon. I was Matt Dillon, they were the guys in black. And only because the sound of my chopper had distorted in the hills and they didn't know precisely where I was going to show up, my vomit of lead got to them about 1/2 second before theirs got to us. I was able to hold on target for most of the remaining 2 seconds of burst, flew on over them and down the hill as planned.

Though I seldom reconned a .50 position that had been engaged by Snakes, I knew for certain the condition of this one. I went back, did one u-turn overflight then ran back down the hill, built up speed and then climbed out to higher altitude. The gun was mangled almost beyond recognition, and that was enough for me. Enough was enough. Neither the Oscar or me could talk for about 5 minutes afterward, and when I finally told the team lead I got a bad case of the shakes. Back at the club that night I got a really bad headache with a 6 hour delay fuse. Best thing I know of to cure a hangover is adrenaline. Down collective, pedal right, hope I am alive tonight...

If you do a Google Earth view of the Valley it's kind of hinky and bears little resemblance of what it was then. The valley is settled, agriculture well developed and it is difficult to imagine the moonscape it once was. It is a better place today than then. Gone are the dragons and terror. Maybe the spirits remain.

I raced motocross for 10 years.
Won a bunch of trophies and a bunch of hardware in my left leg.

That would be so much fun!

DD, outstanding!

Thank's for the story.

Great effing story.


P

Nothing crazy.
Minor rock climbing when younger.
No ropes or specialty gear.

50 to 100ft junk.

Strength and balance gone.
Replaced by strong sense of " dont be stupid ".

I left the house without my cell phone once.


I have a couple PPC's that I bought used and flew with zero training. Push the throttle and figure it out from there.
Woods dozing can get sketchy. I almost got skewered twice and stick to dirt now. Working without a trench box is pretty dumb to.
I've done some welding at pretty high heights with sketchy equipment. Heights are a lot different when the hood is down.
Lots of stupid teenage stuff. Dirt bikes, fast cars, loose women, etc.
Unfortunately no military service here so I can't compete.

Got caught in 100+mph offshore winds between Sand Point and King Cove Ak., on the way to fish Area M in a 36’ gillnetter.

DD:

Powerful writing! Is this book published?

I've been searching, but I can't find it.

John

The most dangerous thing that I ever encountered was to be forcefed stimulates for 10 years prepubescently because my teachers/administrators couldn't handle my exceptional brightness which caused extreme boredom, lack of attention, and 'hyperactivity' while they were teaching beyond basic skills to the bottom of the class. Luckily puberty and Testosterone allowed my brain and I overcome it, so I told everyone to kick rocks and that I'm not taking drugs for non-medical reasons. I left HS a few months after demedicating myself when a teacher attempted to harass me, and I used simple reasoning to make him look infantile, to the enjoyment of the rest of the class. For that, they burned my exceptional academic record as punishment for leaving the State Indoctrination Facility. I was in the top 1% of students in California for Math and Science for 5+ years before and they sent me to hang out with delinquents...would you like to know more..?

Published here on the Fire, otherwise no.

Dunno this is the whole package but it's what I could find. Recollection is that this covers year ! and the rest was kluged up a few years later. Send me a PM with your email and I'll put it all in one pile for you.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...r/6585900/A_roll_of_the_dice#Post6585900

Good Gawd, no.....

A guy at the deer lease shot his wife in the ass with a pellet gun while we were drinking around the campfire. She picked up a burning piece of mesquite, hit him on the head with the burning end. It burned him pretty damn good. She called him names I’d never heard before. He was lucky he had a ball cap on. It was awesome, I didn’t like the smart assed, know it all anyway.

I'll send a PM right away, but I (like MANY others above) would really like to see you publish your manuscript!

You likely won't make much money (you could ask Rocky Raab his profit per book!) but there are a number of internet-based publishing companies who will get your work "out there" for a modest fee. I understand you usually need to pony up some money at the front, but I'm sure that lots of members of the 'Fire would happily contribute to a "Go Fund Me: DigitalDan's book". I would.

The main reason to publish is of course so that your story won't be lost to history!

John

I pulled up a stringer of pumpkinseeds to add another one, there was a cottonmouth swallowing the last one on that string

I was gone jack

Ain’t fished in Bear Spring since