On August 8th, 1974 Presiden Richard Nixon presented his resignation speech to the American people from the Oval Office  and it was carried live on radio and television. Vice President Gerald Ford, who had replaced Spiro Agnew less than a year earlier on  October 12th, 1973, was sworn in the next day as the 38th president of the United States.

Of the many consequences of turmoil in the United States, the country of South Vietnam was affected greatly. They were forced to reduce military operations to conserve fuel and ammunition, causing a decline in morale and moving the balance of military power in favor of the North Vietnamese. (Wikipedia)

26 September 1974 – Friday

BIRD AIR began operating supply flight from Utapao RTNAB to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, using unmarked USAF C130s crewed by civilians and all USAF airlift missions were suspended on 8 October 1974.

 

12 December 1974 – Friday

The North Vietnamese launched their attack on Phroc Long, about 75  miles north of Saigon. One of the objectives of this attack was to test the reaction of the United States, to see if they would uphold President Nixion’s promises of US military intervention against North Vietnam. The United States did not provide military intervention and the US Congress repeatedly voted against additional aid for South Vietnam. By January 6, 1975, the North Vietnamese were in solid control of the province and were able to expand their logistical routes from the Central Highlands to the Mekong Delta. Both the USSR and China continued to pour war materials into North Vietnam.

14 March 1975 – Friday

By March 18th, 1975, with the capture of Ban Me Thuot by the North Vietnamese, there was large scale retreat of civilians and military forces toward the coast. Emboldened by their success in the Central Highlands, the North Vietnamese moved quickly to take advantage of the situation and began to move up their attack on the northern cities of Hue and Danang.  Danang quickly became overwhelmed by the mass of humanity attempting to escape the arrival of the communist. By 28 March, Danang had fallen into chaos and was quickly occupied by the North Vietnamese. They then turned their attention to the south, Saigon.

It was under these circumstances that two 374th TAW C-130s would be tasked to fly technicians into Da Lat, South Vietnam where the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration technicians were to remove the nuclear fuel from a nuclear reactor. Then the two crews would return to Dalat and fly the radioactive fuel and technicians to safety the next day, hopefully before the North Vietnamese arrived.

______________________________________

 

24 Mar 1975  – Monday

A Confidential message is sent to the US Ambassador in Saigon, South Vietnam, Graham Martin, from the US State Department in Washington DC on Monday at 1615 (4:15pm) local Washington DC time.  It is the next morning in Saigon, Tuesday, 0415 (04:15am) local time in Saigon. (Saigon is 12 hours ahead of Washington DC.) In it , the subject of the Dalat Nuclear reactor is brought up and questions Saigon on what are the possible methods to remove the uranium and mentions the use of US aircraft and personnel is possible.

Secretary of State Message242115Z MAR 1975 

 

25 March 1975 – Tuesday

Professor NGO DINH LONG, Director of the Dalat reactor, visits the US embassy in Saigon to discuss the removal of its fuel rods. After much discussion, it is decided the only way to do it is to use American aircraft and technicians.

Meanwhile, in the north of the country, the ancient capital of  Hue falls to the North Vietnamese army. The roads running to the south are in chaos as a mass exodus of civilians and former South Vietnamese military personnel attempt to escape the North Vietnamese

 

26 March 1975 –  Wednesday

In response to Kissinger’s inquiry, the US embassy in Saigon sends a reply back to Kissinger, requesting that US aircraft, technicians, and the casks to store the 67 nuclear fuel rods in be sent to Vietnam.

AMEMBASSY SAIGON MSG 2603152Z MAR 1975 PG2. The message was sent on Wednesday, Mar26, at 1015 local Saigon time. It would be the day before, Tuesday, 25 Mar 1975 at 2215L Washington DC time.

Wednesday 26 March 1975 – Kadena AB, Okinawa

Meanwhile, at Kadena AB in Okinawa, Japan, several 345 TAS crews assemble in the squadron to prepare for a flight to transport a C130 to Utapao RTAFB in Thailand. 

“CASTE 35, winds 350 at 10 gust to 20, light drizzle, cleared for takeoff runway 05 Right”. And with the Kadena tower takeoff clearance, the pilot slowly pushed up the four throttles of the 345 TAS C130, tail # 637840, until the torque meters showed approximated 19600 inch pounds of torque on each of the Allison 501/T56-7 engines. Turbine Inlet Temperature (TIT) held below 971 degees. The copilot’s hand was at the base of the four throttles, monitoring the engine instruments and holding the yoke with his right hand, in left wing down position to account for the slight crosswind. And the camoflaged plane lumbered forward, slowly gaining airspeed. As we accelerated through 50 knots, the aircraft commander, Captain Towe, took his left hand off of the nosewheel steering and shifted it to hold his yoke, stating over the hot mic of the intercomm system “Pilot’s Yoke”.  The copilot slowly released his grip on the yoke as he felt the pilot take control of it. At 102 knots, the pilot slowly pulled back on the yoke and felt the 141,000 pound aircraft rotate its black nose upward, lifting the nose wheel off the 12,000 foot long SAC runway.  And the main gear soon followed as the entire aircraft became airborne at 9:25 local Kadena time. 

The mission had begun that morning, just after 7:00 AM in the 345 TAS squadron building, located next to the Kadena AB flight line fire station, about midfield on the USAF (south) side of the dual runway airbase. As I and other crewmembers began to show up, we glanced at the mission folder laying on the ops desk just inside in the squadron door. I had arrived on Kadena just a month and a half before and had finally been checked out (cleared to fly unsupervised) as a “Combat Qualified” C-130 copilot. Both the loadmaster and flight engineer took a copy of flight orders for later use. Once everyone was there, the aircraft commander, Captain Towe, gave a brief overview of the mission and answered a few questions. 

---

Our mission was to take one of our squadron’s aircraft, a C-130E, aircraft tail number 63-7840,  to Utapao Royal Thai Naval AIr Base (RTNAB), on the coast in Thailand. There we would hand it over to a 374 TAW detachment who in turn would  use it to fly supplies into Cambodia in support of the Cambodian government. Active duty USAF units from Little Rock and Pope AFB had been flying these missions but  there was mounting Congressional opposition to the involvement of the US military in Cambodia. As such, in the summer of 1974, the USAF decided to replace the active duty aircrews with civilian aircrews belonging to a US company “Bird Air”. The original contract called for Bird Air to furnish five six-man crews from September 1974 through June, 1975, In turn, the USAF would supply five C-130 aircraft, plus ground maintenance, refueling, and cargo loading, for them to fly. The planes would be stripped of any US markings and only have a small tail number placed on the aircraft’s vertical stabillizer. The Bird Air C-130s would then be registered in Cambodia where the company maintains an office. The Cambodian government handledd the arrangements with the Thai government to use the facilities at Utapao, which is a Royal Thai Naval Air Base, This contract was extended in February 1975 to add seven more C-130s (12 total) and eight more civilian Bird Air crews (13 total) and eight additional ground personnel to the flights. Most of Bird Air’s crewmembers came from former USAF C-130 crewmembers in the United States. The loadmasters were Thai.  Bird Air’s first mission over Cambodia took place on 26 February 1974 while all USAF crewed flights ended on 26 September 1974. Bird Air was contracted to make up to 20 flights a day (240 tons) into  Phnom Penh after the extension.

Once we turned over 63-7840 to the Bird Air operation, we would fly another C-130E back to Okinawa. Here our maintenance people would inspect and repair it as necessary to bring it back up to USAF standards after some hard use by Bird Air. 

---

There would be two crews on the aircraft, a primary one that would fly it and a secondary one that would deadhead (not actually perforning crew duties, passengers in certain respects). As my luck would have it, I would deadhead. Our itinerary had us taking some F-4 crewmembers and maintenance people to Ching Chuan Kang AB (Referred to as CCK AB) in Taiwan  first, then proceeding on to spend the night (referred to as an RON – remain over night) at Clark AB in the Philippines.We would proceed the next day to Utapao RTNAB, then return the next day direct to Kadena AB in Okinawa. Since I was not part of a “Designated Crew” yet, I would be pretty much a “strap hanger” on this scheduled three-day off-island mission, getting seat time when they let me.

 

 

Years earlier, in 1963 . . .

 

Da Lat, South Vietnam, is a tourist and university town in the Central Highlands of South Vietnam. At an altitude of 5000 feet, its climate offers Vietnam’s elite an escape from the heat of the lowlands. And it is  also a source for fresh vegetables not found in the heat of the lowlands. The US military during the Vietnam war would send C130s there to pick up pallets of fresh vegetables.

In 1963, South Vietnam began operating a small Triga-Mark II nuclear reactor in Da Lat, South Vietnam as part of the US Atoms for Peace program.

 

The Da Lat Nuclear Research Institute did its work in secret but by March 1975, it was using fuel rods of the most advanced US design, much more advanced than anything their rival the Soviet Union had at the time. The facility had come under fire during the Tet offensive in January 1968, and one of its Vietnamese operators had been executed. But it was not until 1975 that Washington became alarmed. And when the rapid fall of the South Vietnam government began only sixty miles from Da Lat, in Ban Me Thuot, in early March 1975, the United States government became very concerned.

 

________________________________________

 

The curse of the “Firm Crew”

Per scheduling regulations, an airlft squadron could not normally allow a crewmember to fly a regular “off-island”  mission unless you were part of a “Designated Crew”. A “Designated Crew”, also known as a “Firm Crew”,  is one where each crew position is listed  and a corresponding name is attached to that postion. The theory behind the rule was safety. In theory, if you fly together long enough, you learn each others habits and are ideally “safer”. Until you got on a crew, you were relegated to flying pilot profieciency flights or flights with an Instructor pilot. Otherwise, the squadron would be dinged in the all so important report to headquarters. And as a squadron commander you did not get promoted with  lot of “dings”.

I had arrived on Kadena Air Base just two months before, and had not yet been assigned a “designated crew. Well I had actually, but my designated  aircraft commander, fresh from duty as a T38 instructor pilot, had not arrived yet on Okinawa. He had just completed C130 transition training at Little Rock AFB in Arkansas. So I was in limbo. I had been scheduled to fly about 8 local pilot proficiency flights at Kadena, but they were notorious for breaking. Our maintenance had suffered when we moved to Okinawa in late 1973 from CCK. The wing and squadron at the time was assigned to Pacific Air Forces, or PACAF. On Okinawa, with our wing stationed at Clark AB, Philippines, we were assigned maintenance from the host Kadena PACAF unit, the 18th Tactical Fighter WIng (TFW0, an F4 wing. And of course the F4s had priority. 

_______________________________________________________________________________

Since November of 1972, the 18th Tactical Fighter Wing maintained a detachment from two squadrons ( 44th Fighter Squadron and 67th Fighter Squadron  ) of F4 Phantoms at CCK AB to maintain an alert presence in Taiwan. They arrived shortly after Taiwan donated aircraft for Washington’s 1972 effort to build up South Vietnam’s air power before the cease‐fire. CCK was the former home for the 345th TAS and had the reputation of being a nice base. But with the end of the Vietnam war, and relations with Communist China improving, the five C130 squadrons stationed there were deployed to other bases or disbanded all together in the fall of 1973.

The flight to CCK was a short hour and twenty minute flight and we were airborne again after little under two hour ground time at CCK. After takeoff from CCK, we headed south toward the Philippines, a little over  2 hours away at our normal cruise airspeed of 210 True Airspeed. Again the weather smiled upon us and we were soon approaching the island of Luzon from the north.  We passed over shore line of the Lingayen Gulf near Wallace Air Station at 20,000 feet and shortly afterwards contacted Clark Approach control. Their reply came back quickly, in an American voice: “CASTE 35, radar contact , 48 miles north of Clark AB, descend and maintain 5000 feet. Clark altiimeter 29.84, winds 030 at 8, expect land runway 20” .

The landing at 1545 local time was uneventful and we taxied to one of the C130 hardstands located on the southwest side of the runway. Originally built in World War 2 to park B24 bombers, the hardstands were perfect for parking a C130.

During postflight, there was a small leak of fluid seeping out from # 2 prop but maintenance could look at it overnight. A blue crewbus was waiting for us and after the compulsory bag drag of luggage and flight equipment to the bus, we proceeded to the command post located in the base operations building. The copilot dropped off his “secrets” at base ops and the aircraft commander walked down the hall to talk to the command post controller. Takeoff was scheduled for 9:00am the next morning and there seemed to be no problems. We got back on our crew bus and then proceeded to drop the enlisted off at the enlisted billeting office near the Silver Wings rec center. We then rode the crew bus to the officer billeting office, which at the time was a small building across from the base library. Arranged to the side and rear of the billeting office were several long concrete block buildings, much like a motel, where we were assigned our rooms. We paid our $2.00 room fee and dragged our bags off the bus to our rooms.

A few of us met later that day and walked the half mile along the 13 AF parade grounds and Wirt Davis Ave to the Clark AB Officer’s Club for dinner. On the walk we  passed by the old “Barns” that had been built in the early 1900s and were still in use as houses for American officer families. Under the canopy of giant Acacia (Monkeypod) trees, they were a memory of the past. They were built on stilts off the ground that allowed the air to flow under the houses, cooling them. 

The Officer’s Club itself was of the “Barn” type construction and you had to walk up maybe 8 wooden steps to the entrance. On entering the foyer, the bar was off to the left and the large dining room was off to the right. A first class meal with white table cloths, formally dressed Filipino waiters,  and fine silverware impressed upon you the history and atmosphere of the tropics the base held. 

 

Thursday 27 March 1975 – Saigon, South Vietnam

 

 

 

 

Thursday 27 March 1975 – Clark AB, Philippines

 

We leave Clark AB for the four hour flight to Utapao RTAFB, Thailand

 

With a 0645 local show time, we arranged with crew transport for a pickup at 0515 at billeting. Once we loaded the officers and their bags, we proceeded to pick up the enlisted crewmembers then on to the parking spot where we offloaded the bags. Then on into the base operations building where we checked in with command post to confirm our itinerary. Inflight meals were ordered, along with a gallon or two of coffee. At the time, we were under PACAF and had to get our own inflight meals and coffee. This entailed getting the two stainless jugs off the airplane and taking them into the inflight kitched to get one filled with ice water and another one filled with coffee.  And it was not free, the coffee drinkers usually took up a small collection. Then we had to drag the full jugs back to the airplane. I think the copilot was responsible for this but it could have been the loadmaster, can not remember. (After we went under MAC a few months lated, “Fleet Service” would do this for us. One good thing about MAC.)

There was a small BX operated snack bar in the base operations building where you could get a greasy hamburger or eggs/bacon for a few dollars. Not a bad meal, and convenient. After filing our DD Form 1801 ICAO flight plan, and the copilot had picked up his “Secrets”, we sat down for a quick breakfast. We called for another crew bus to take us back to the aircraft, trying to get there about an hour before scheduled takeoff.

 

The flight to Utapao RTNAB was uneventful,, landing at _________

Good Friday, 28 March 1975 – Utapao RTAFB,  Thailand

 

 

We prepare to depart Utapao to return with another aircraft, 63-7895, to Kadena

SCARP 44

Saturday – 29 March 1975  A day off and the waiting game begins

Military scholars throughout the ages have been aware of Sun Tzu’s Principles of War. Perhaps the most accurate one that applied on this day before Easter Sunday in 1975 was that of “Hurry Up and Wait”. And that is what we did, wait. I don’t remember much of that somber day but you could feel a tension in the air. No one told us what the plans were and we sat around and  talked about the rumors floating around. The one I kept hearing the most was that we were going to be sent into Danang to ferry out refugees. Danang at the time was in a state of chaos.The North Vietnamese were barreling down Hwy One from Hue and there was not much to stop them as the South Vietnamese army was disintergrating. Danang had filled with refugees trying to get out whichever way they could. Perhaps the most telling evidence of the situation on the ground that day there can be seen in this film shot by a CBS news crew aboard a World AIrways Boeing 727.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdOuDwbT9Jo

The plane was able to land successfully at Tan Son Nhut AB in Saigon and they considered themselves lucky. Memories to be repeated at the much more documented evacuation of Kabul, Afghanistan fifty six years later in August 2021. We were to meet Mr Ed Daly, president and owner of World AIrways, who was aboard the overloaded Boeing 727 that day, pistol in hand, throwing frightened soldier off of the aircraft’s back stairs.

That night, my aircraft commander, Captain Nelson Newhouse, and our navigator, Captain _____, were summoned to meet with Lt Col Reed. This was my first mission with Capt Newhouse who I later learned had been a West Point graduate and served a tour or two in Vietnam previously as an infantry officer. It was also my first time wth the navgator. My first impression was that he was a quiet and professional navigator, and seemed very knowledgeable. While waiting for them I walked over to the Utapao O’Club to get a bite to eat. They had a screened-in snack bar in the back where you could get a greasy hamburger and fries which is what I ordered. While sitting there waiting on it, it was fun to watch the F U  lizards crawling across the ceiling in search of mosquitoes or flies. Anyone new to southeast Asia quickly learns to recognize the sounds of the Geckos. It was during this wait that I looked up and focused on a tall man in a flight suit, also ordering something. My memory quickly identified him. Mark H., who I had spent at year at Webb AFB, Texas, with in pilot training just two years before. He had been assigned to a B52 at one of the northern tier US air bases on graduation from Webb AFB and I had gone to Thailand to fly the old T29 in support of a general.

We exhanged surprised handshakes and hellos and enjoyed our burgers together. I quickly came to realize that he was “Not a Happy Camper”, a term we used to describe someone who was obviously not having a good day. We all had been told not to drink anything, which attributed to the mooted ambience of the snack bar that day. In slow and mournful conversation, he told me that he was TDY (temporary duty, visiting) to Utapao and had been summoned with all of the other B52 crewmembers to a briefing in the base theater that day. Utapao was one of two bases (Andersen AFB, Guam was the other) the USAF used in southeast Asia to base B52s at during their bombings during the Vietnam war. And it had been the B52s used by President Nixon in 1973 during LINEBACKER ONE in April 1972 to stop the NVA Spring offensive.  And the LINEBACKER TWO missions over North VIetnam in December 1972 to get the North Vietnamese back to the peace talks in Paris.Operating in cells of three, each B52 could drop ____  bombs on a target. And it was not withour losses. A total of —-   B52s were shot down by the North Vietnamese. Which was fresh in the memory of the B52 crews and my friend. And there were rumors that the B52 on Utapao were being loaded with bombs as we spoke. After a short while, we exchanged goodbyes as both had to get some rest for the unknown tomorrow. I never saw him again.

I went back to the trailer I was sharing with the Aircraft Commander and Navigator. They were both there, having just returned from their meeting with our 345th TAS Operations Officer, Lt Col H. Ree. And both were “Not Happy Campers”.

   “Madden, here is $20. Go get me three Johnny Walker Black miniatures at the Club” Newhouse        told me. I took the bill and innocently asked him what they had been told by LtCol Reed and what we were doing tomorrow.. 

   “Madden, just go get them. I will tell you what is going on when you get back.”   “Ok, Ok” I replied and quickly started for the door. _____, our navigator was also going out the door too and I asked him where he was going.   “I am going to the Midnight Mass (Vigil)” he replied. “I didn’t know you were Catholic” I said. “I’m not” he said as he scrambled off into the darkness.

   “Ok” I said to myself and walked to the club. But my interest was peaked.

Getting back to the trailer with the Johnny Walker, I handed them to Capt Newhouse, who promptly drank one. He told me the plan. We were to leave tomorrow morning and fly a C130 loaded with an All Terrain forklift toTan Son Nhut AB, Saigon.  (The All Terrain forlift is a huge diesel powered forlift that, as its name implies, can operate on most any terrain. It had huge tires). At Saigon, we would rendezvous with another C130 flying in from Clark AB. It would have special containers, or “casks” as they called them aboard. (They turned out to be 55 gallon barrells ful of concrete with  hollow metal pipe in the middle.) There was a nuclear reactor located in the mountain town of Dalat, South Vietnam and our mission was to take two technicians there so they could remove the nuclear fuel  and put it in the casks. We would then return the next day to pick them up  and fly our happy ways. So that was it in a nutshell. I had a lot of unanswered questions but decided to go on to bed, while Newhouse finished his Johnny Walkers. 

 

 

 

a  few days later.

 

 

Easter Sunday 30 March 1975 – We fly to Saigon

We woke up early on Easter Sunday at Utapao RTAFB.

 

 

 

 

SUNDAY 30 March 1975 0528Z = 1228 Local Saigon time

 

 

 

 

Sunday, 30 March 1975 – SEC STATE WASH DC 301543Z Message to the American Embassy in Saigon.

1543Z = 2243 Local Saigon time

 

 

Klong 45J completed its offload and contacted us, stating they were finished and were ready to leave. We got our crew on headset and started engines without difficulty. We lifted off from Dalat at 1800 local time and turned east toward the coast with the sun setting behind us. The flight back to Saigon was also uneventful and we touched down at Tan Son Nhut AB at 1920 local time, about 20 minutes after sunset.

 

31 March 1975  – We return to Dalat

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

 

American Embassy message to Washington DC

310145Z Mar 1975

 

Monday afternoon, 31 March 1975: Klong 45J taxis to takeoff from Tan Son Nhut AB to fly the casks of nuclear fuel to Clark AB, Phillipines. At Clark, the casks will be loaded onto a C141 for shipment to Johnston Island. (Madden photo)

 

311110Z Mar 1975 Message from the Sec State Washington DC to the US Embassy in Saigon. (Monday – 1810 Local Saigon Time)

CIA Intelligence Monday, 31 March 1975 map of South Vietnam showing the area of the country that they assessed the NVA had control of.

 

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Two days later, the North Vietnamese took Da Lat. The US scientists had completed the mission just in time. North Vietnamese soldiers photographed the reactor’s empty core.

 

 

 

 

 

April 1975

1 April 1975 – Klong 970 departs Tan Son Nhut AB with the tactical K-Loader onboard, at just past midnight local time, 0025 on the first of April 1975. Takeoff and climbout were uneventful and as we leveled off at altitude, the flight deck got quite, with each crew member relaxing. It was a clear night and you could see flares in the air in the Can Tho area as we passed to the west of it. Only a 50 minute flight, we contacted Utapao Approach Control and requested landing. No one else was in the pattern and we touched down at 0115 local Utapao time. It was over.

 

 

Aftermath . . .

 

 

 

 

Oops, my bad . . .DOE reveals Vietnam plutonium mistake

END ———————————————–

 

Thursday, Jan. 16, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.

The government has disclosed that two scientists undertook a desperate mission in 1975 to retrieve plutonium from a Vietnamese reactor under sniper fire, only to learn years later the canister they carried out during the Vietnam War had been mislabeled.

The mislabeling was discovered in 1979 by Thomas Blankenship, security director for the Department of Energy’s Nevada Operations Office. His discovery meant that despite the best efforts of American military and civilian officials, about 3 ounces of plutonium remained in Vietnam.

That amount, however, is far less than what is needed to build a bomb.

The whole incident became public in recent weeks as the result of the DOE’s decision to open records that had previously been classified. Energy Secretary Hazel O’Leary said the incident, while an eye-opener, is not one of catastrophic proportions.

The scientists involved in the retrieval mission feared they might fail or even get killed.

“Looking back, I figure we had only a 50-50 chance of pulling it off,” said Wally Hendrickson, who now works at the nuclear reservation in Hanford, Wash.

Weeks after rescuing what he thought was 80 grams of weapons-usable plutonium, Hendrickson was rescued by helicopter from the roof of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon as U.S.-backed South Vietnam fell. He was one of the last Americans to leave Vietnam in 1975.

“One lady said, if the (Viet Cong) caught us they would chop off our heads,” Hendrickson said. “They were probably right.”

The canister retrieved by Hendrickson and John Horan, a scientist at the Department of Energy’s Idaho Falls facility, sat at Hanford for three years before the labeling mistake was discovered in 1979 and it was found to hold the decayed remains of another radioactive isotope, polonium.

For years, the fact the United States may have left a canister of plutonium behind in Vietnam remained a secret.

“The documents were classified to protect the fact the plutonium was unaccounted for,” the Energy Department said in a press release. But the paper trail also hints at errors in record-keeping, including sending the wrong forms to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Department officials were all but stunned when they recently found the documents as part of their effort to make public millions of pages of what had previously been classified documents. They immediately notified the State Department, the IAEA and the Vietnamese government.

O’Leary said investigators, with the cooperation of the Vietnamese government, believe they might already have found the plutonium, still at a research reactor in Dalat. An international team is scheduled to inspect the Dalat facility in February.

Hendrickson said he was surprised to learn the canister he and Horan had brought out of Vietnam was the wrong one.

“I thought I had the right one,” said Hendrickson, who calls himself a “technical guy” with four engineering degrees. He is working on a tank safety program at Hanford.

The plutonium and other radioactive materials had been transferred to the South Vietnamese government by the United States in 1962 as part of the Atoms for Peace program. The reactor at Dalat was used to produce radioisotopes for research and medical purposes.

In the spring of 1975, as the Communists were on the verge of conquering South Vietnam, the director of the Dalat reactor came to the U.S. Embassy in Saigon to remind American officials that plutonium and highly enriched uranium were stored at the reactor.

The reminder set off panic in the embassy, and immediately volunteers were sought. Hendrickson, who was 39 at the time, and Horan stepped forward.

The U.S. ambassador in Saigon had told them if the village was overrun, they were on their own and their best escape route was to walk 50 miles through the jungle to the coast. The mission took place on Easter Sunday in hopes the Viet Cong would be lulled into thinking Americans would be celebrating the religious holiday.

Hendrickson said he became worried only when an embassy official kept reminding them they were volunteers and they were told they would not be rescued if things went awry.

“It dawned on me how serious this was,” he said. “The government seemed a little casual about this, but it was dangerous.”

A cargo plane carrying special equipment to handle the radioactive materials flew them into Dalat and they stayed two days working around the clock.

“We saw Viet Cong prisoners in the city and Vietnamese forces were sweeping the area,” Hendrickson said. “We worked day and night, no sleep, little food. Horan got shot at one night.”

After packing up the nuclear materials, Hendrickson and Horan flew out on a plane loaded with refugees just hours before Dalat fell.

“It was really nerve-wracking,” he said. “It wasn’t so much bravery, we were just dedicated to get this stuff out.”

---

“We were told distinctly that if we could not remove the fuel and get it out of the country, we were to make it inaccessible and to pour concrete [over it],” he says. “To get concrete and lift it 20 feet in the air and pour it down to cover the core.” But it was what the scientists were told next that was most shocking.

If all else failed, they were told, they must blow up the nuclear reactor. “We were to dynamite the core,” says Hendrikson.

To the scientists, the act was unacceptable in humanitarian terms. But the Defense Department and its officials had considered the plan.

Retired Army Colonel Rich Miller told NHK, “Early in the discussion the thought of blowing up the reactor in place was brought up and I actually did some calculations on how much TNT it would take, and so on.”

Details of the mission were recorded in a log book by John Horan. The book notes that Hendrikson and Horan landed at Cam Ly Airport, near Da Lat, to a scene of chaos. North Vietnames forces were closing in.

The log book entry reads: “On March 30, 10:45am, after landing, the co-pilot refused to enter the taxiing runway, where many refugees were waiting.”

Refugees flooded the airport. They were fleeing the approaching North Vietnamese, and looking for help from the US. The scientists wanted to help. But they were overruled.

Another entry reads: “The Pentagon would not authorize carrying refugees on the return flight to Saigon after our equipment was unloaded.”

And in following entries: “Ambassador Graham Martin said: no refugees out — no mission.”

“Blow up the reactor.”

Ambassador Martin insisted on transporting the refugees, and urged Pentagon officials to allow it.

The log said: “Flash message sent to Pentagon. In 90 minutes, approval was received.”

Miller says defense officials then decided against dynamiting the reactor. “We recommended against it because the spread of radioactivity wouldn’t have been a good idea,” he says. “I thought it would be a big propaganda tool for communists. So that idea, as far as I knew, was dropped as not being reasonable.”

Finally, Hendrikson and his team arrived at the reactor and began recovering the fuel. They had only until the transport plane returned, at 1PM the next day. The job was dangerous. The workers had to build a protective wall to keep safe from radiation. To limit exposure, they worked in a rotation of 4-person shifts. While one member hoisted the fuel rods, others would hide behind a protective wall, shielding themselves from radiation.

Pictures show the team removing the fuel rods. Instead of a crane, workers used their hands to save time. From the top of the reactor, they lowered a hook into the core, and used it to lift the fuel rods, one by one.

In the morning that same day, North Vietnamese forces reached a base just 8 miles from Da Lat.

Retired Major General Nguyen Quy says the soldiers had orders to secure the nuclear facility. “We heard a lot about the reactor,” he says. “That it was prized because it was made in the United States.”

Hendrikson’s team continued to work late into the night. It’s unknown how much radiation exposure they received. Finally at 2AM on March 31st, the team finished the job.

That same day, a transport plane loaded with the recovered fuel left for the US, as scheduled. Two days later, the North Vietnamese took Da Lat. The US scientists had completed the mission just in time. North Vietnamese soldiers photographed the reactor’s empty core. The last-minute efforts of the US scientists had averted the unimaginable option of dynamiting the reactor.

Hendrikson felt relief. “I’m not used to military situations,” he said. “The town was a tourist town. A university was there. It was a great agricultural area. And you don’t do that sort of thing under normal conditions — you don’t think of that. I can’t justify that. I think it would have been a war crime.”

 

A concrete cover was not a realistic possibility at the time, according to Wally Hendrikson, who was then a nuclear fuel specialist at the Idaho National Laboratory and a member of the team sent in to carry our Kissinger’s orders. In his report, he tells his understanding of his orders, if they couldn’t get the fuel rods out in time:

“We were to dynamite the core.”

That it didn’t come to that was due to the heroic efforts of a team of four men, including Wally Hendrikson, and John Horan, a fellow scientist. It is the log book maintained by Horan that detailed events from their landing at Cam Ly Airport on the morning of 30 March, when they were told by Ambassador Graham Martin: “Blow up the reactor”.

Until their plane took off with the fuel rods safely aboard on the morning of 31 March, just two days before Da Lat was finally liberated from those ready to visit the region with long lasting death and destruction. The scientists accomplished this feat by disregarding all normal safety procedures and working through the night. They were up against a hard deadline because if they couldn’t get the fuel rods out in time to make the scheduled transport flight the next day, the core was to be blown up. In the words of Wally Hendrikson,

“The town was a tourist town. A university was there. It was a great agricultural area. And you don’t do that sort of thing under normal conditions — you don’t think of that. I can’t justify that. I think it would have been a war crime.”

Easter Sunday 31 March 1975

As bullets ricocheted around them, they took the canister believed to house not only plutonium but also highly enriched uranium fuel supplied under the Atoms for Peace program. Fleeing under darkness, they were flown back to Saigon the night of April 1, 1975. Almost immediately, they learned that Da Lat had fallen

 

Mr. Hendrickson said he and his comrade, John Horan, had been warned by the American Embassy in Saigon that they would be on their own if Da Lat was overrun while they were there. Mr. Hendrickson and Mr. Horan were working at the time for the Energy Research and Development Administration in Richland, Wash., a predecessor of the Energy Department.

The team exposed themselves to the nuclear risk, worked in shifts, each of the four taking turns, removing the fuel rods by hand, while the other three sheltered behind a makeshift radiation wall, because the normal procedure that uses robots and cranes would have taken too long.

PLUTONIUM LEFT IN VIETNAM IS SAFE

By Associated Press  Jan 19, 1997, 12:00am MST

Three ounces of weapons-grade plutonium left behind by retreating U.S. forces at the end of the Vietnam War are in safe storage and pose no threat to the environment, the government said Saturday.

The U.S. Energy Department disclosed last week that the plutonium was mistakenly left behind in 1975 at the U.S.-built Dalat Nuclear Research Institute in South Vietnam.The plutonium is still at the facility, Foreign Ministry spokesman Tran Quang Hoan told The Associated Press.

“The Dalat Nuclear Research Institute is currently preserving the amount of plutonium left behind by the Americans as required by technical necessity,” Hoan said.Report ad

The United States learned of the forgotten plutonium recently when declassified documents explained its disappearance. In Vietnam, the issue was an equally well-guarded secret.

A team of U.S. scientists that toured the Dalat research reactor in October was not told about the plutonium, a western diplomat said. The visit was made as a side trip by scientists traveling with Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Anne Soloman.

It is unclear how long Vietnam has been aware of the plutonium, but with the help of Russian scientists, Hanoi had the Dalat facility operational after the end of the war almost 21 years ago.

Energy Secretary Hazel O’Leary told a news conference in Washington on Wednesday the small amount of plutonium was not a significant risk for nuclear weapons proliferation.

O’Leary said Vietnam and the United States were holding talks about returning the plutonium.

U.S. Embassy officials refused to give details on the talks but described the Vietnamese side as “very cooperative.”

Hoan, the Foreign Ministry spokesman, emphasized the nuclear material was in safekeeping.

“There is absolutely no danger in terms of effects on humans and the environment,” Hoan said.

Nuclear technicians from a federal weapons laboratory inadvertently left the plutonium behind when they were sent in to dismantle the Dalat facility in March 1975 – weeks before Saigon fell to advancing Communist troops from North Vietnam.

 

Vietnamese authorities later rebuilt the reactor at Da Lat, using technology and nuclear fuel from the Soviet Union. Forty years after the war, the facility still stands. It remains the only functioning research reactor in Vietnam.

REFERENCES:

Now It Can Be Told: Plutonium and a Do-or-Die Vietnam Foray – The New York Times (nytimes.com) By David Stout Jan. 16, 1997

 

THE FINAL COLLAPSE
by
GENERAL GAO VAN VIEN
CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY
UNITED STATES ARMY
Washington D.C., 1985

DOE reveals Vietnam plutonium mistake – Las Vegas Sun Newspaper Thursday, Jan. 16, 1997