Milton, Fla, native, Maj. Richard D. Joyce (left), an AH-1W Super Cobra pilot with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 169, Marine Aircraft Group 40, Marine Expeditionary Brigade - Afghanistan, received the Distinguished Flying Cross with combat distinguished device for his heroic actions in support of ground troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom March 2007. Joyce's former commander, Army Col. Clayton M. Hutmacher, commanding officer of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), flew to Afghanistan to present the award to the Florida State University alumni.

A Marine with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 169, nicknamed the Vipers, recently received one of the highest honors of a Marine aviator for acts of heroism during Operating Iraqi Freedom.

Maj. Richard D. Joyce, an AH-1W Cobra pilot with the Vipers of Marine Aircraft Group 40, Marine Expeditionary Brigade Afghanistan, received the Distinguished Flying Cross with combat distinguishing device here July 29 from his previous commanding officer, Army Col. Clayton M. Hutmacher, the commanding officer of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne). Joyce earned the honors for his efforts in supporting a special operations mission during OIF March 2, 2007.

During the operation, Joyce provided fire support for a ground force pinned down by enemy fire. His actions allowed the troops to break contact and move to an extraction point.

“He remained in contact after his wingman’s aircraft was damaged by hostile fire and conducted numerous close engagements against multiple vehicle mounted air defense artillery systems,” according to the award citation signed by Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. James Conway.

Prior to being assigned to the 160th, Joyce participated in a rigorous selection process that began with detailed screening by Headquarters Marine Corps followed by another assessment from the Army. Once selected, Joyce became a pilot with Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), making him one of only five Marine pilots to serve in that command since 1993.

“It was a great opportunity and eye-opening experience,” said Joyce. “The most important thing is that not a single ground troop got hurt and secondly, not a single pilot got hurt. Everybody went home safely, and the bad guys paid the price in the end. That is success to me.”

Joyce was glad to see his previous commanding officer when Hutmacher stepped on deck and acknowledged him for his hard work that particular day.

“I know any other pilot would have done the same exact thing in the given situation because this is what we train for,” Joyce explained.

“He very well deserved the award,” said Lt. Col. Thomas Dolan, the Vipers commanding officer. “His courage, discipline, will to stay in the fight and refusal to give up on fellow comrades proves it.”

Joyce, a native of Milton, Fla., aspired to be a Marine Corps aviator at a young age, following in his father’s footsteps as a Cobra pilot. His father served as an instructor at a flight school aboard Naval Air Station Whiting Field, Fla., just outside of Milton.

He pursued his aspirations by joining the Marine Corps in 1995 after graduating from Florida State University with a bachelor’s degree in criminology. He completed flight school in 1998 and served with HMLA-369, MAG-39, out of Okinawa, Japan, before serving in the unique billet with the 160th.

Joyce has since moved on from his days flying in support of Army troops, returning to a Marine squadron. In a new environment, given a new situation and facing a new enemy, he said there is no other place he would prefer to be than here supporting Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan.

“Our marquee mission is to provide close air support, transport supplies, and provide a presence that intimidates the enemy,” said Joyce. “Once they (insurgents) hear the rotors, they tend to scatter, and if we can provide that sense of security and relief for the ground guys to get a minute to relax, then that is success.”

DVIDS
Story by Lance Cpl. Samuel Nasso

Captain Kim N. Campbell with her damaged A-10 Warthog

First profiled here.

Captain Kim N. Campbell is awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for heroism while participating in aerial flight as an A/OA-10 fighter pilot, 75th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron, 332d Expeditionary Operations Group, 332d Air Expeditionary Wing at Ahmed Al Jaber Air Base, Kuwait on 7 April 2003.

On that date, at North Baghdad Bridge, Iraq, flying as Yard 06, Captain Campbell’s professional skill and airmanship directly contributed to the successful close air support of ground forces from the 3d Infantry Division and recovery of an A-10 with heavy battle damage. While ingressing her original target area, Captain Campbell was diverted to a troops-in-contact situation where enemy forces had positioned themselves within 400 meters of the advancing friendly forces and were successfully preventing the lead elements of the 3d Infantry Division from crossing the North Baghdad Bridge.

Unable to eliminate the enemy without severe losses, the ground forward air controller had requested immediate close air support. After a quick situation update and target area study, Captain Campbell expertly employed 2.75 inch high explosive rockets on the enemy position that had been threatening the advancing forces, scoring a direct hit and silencing the opposition.

During her recovery from the weapons delivery pass, a surface-to-air missile impacted the tail of Captain Campbell’s aircraft. Immediately taking corrective action, she isolated the hydraulic systems and placed the A-10 into the manual reversion flight control mode of flight and prepared for the long and tenuous return flight to Kuwait.

Captain Campbell’s aviation prowess and coolness under pressure directly contributed to the successful completion of the critical mission and recovery of a valuable combat aircraft. The outstanding heroism and selfless devotion to duty displayed by Captain Campbell reflect great credit upon herself and the United States Air Force.

Distinguished Flying Cross Society

Damage from missle to Captain Kim N. Campbell's A-10 Warthog

Captain Kim N. Campbell stands with her battle damaged A-10 Warthog

With the throttle still full out, Campbell began to make her move up and away from the target. She was just beginning to move to her left, with the familiar, solid sensation of G-forces underneath her seat, “when I felt and heard a large explosion in the back of the aircraft.”

“There was no doubt in my mind,” she said. “I knew exactly what it was. I knew I’d been hit.”

It was an anti-aircraft missile, and the impact had sheared both hydraulic lines to her jet.

“Our hydraulics are really what allow our flight control system to function normally,” Campbell said. If the system is compromised, rudders, flaps, and other critical flight and landing gear won’t work.

“At this point there’s really one option,” Campbell said, “and that’s to switch to manual inversion” the A-10′s backup system of cables.

Campbell also knew she had a second option: eject and allow the plane to crash.

But there were civilians down there, and there was no knowing who would be hit by the burning Warthog.

Moreover, “ejecting in itself over friendly territory is one thing. Now, ejecting over enemy territory and going down over Baghdad, where we were just delivering ordnance on Iraqi Republican Guard, is a totally different story.”

Stars & Stripes

Distinguished Flying Cross

KSHB-TV

On June 2, 2007, Hammon left Baghdad en route to Balad Air Force base 42 miles north of Iraq’s capital. He had four crew members and six soldiers on board as the helicopter flew through the night sky.

With night vision goggles on, they crossed a palm grove on the Tigris River. Everything was going smoothly.

From below, tracers zipped by from all directions. Bullets from three different gun systems on the ground tore through the Black Hawk’s Achilles heel – its tail.

Without a tail rotor, steering rumbled. They were going down.

(more…)

Distinguished Flying Cross for Heroism

Citation

Captain Kim N. Campbell is awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for heroism while participating in aerial flight as an A/OA-10 fighter pilot, 75th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron, 332d Expeditionary Operations Group, 332d Air Expeditionary Wing at Ahmed Al Jaber Air Base, Kuwait on 7 April 2003. On that date, at North Baghdad Bridge, Iraq, flying as Yard 06, Captain Campbell’s professional skill and airmanship directly contributed to the successful close air support of ground forces from the 3d Infantry Division and recovery of an A-10 with heavy battle damage. While ingressing her original target area, Captain Campbell was diverted to a troops-in-contact situation where enemy forces had positioned themselves within 400 meters of the advancing friendly forces and were successfully preventing the lead elements of the 3d Infantry Division from crossing the North Baghdad Bridge.

Unable to eliminate the enemy without severe losses, the ground forward air controller had requested immediate close air support. After a quick situation update and target area study, Captain Campbell expertly employed 2.75 inch high explosive rockets on the enemy position that had been threatening the advancing forces, scoring a direct hit and silencing the opposition.

During her recovery from the weapons delivery pass, a surface-to-air missile impacted the tail of Captain Campbell’s aircraft. Immediately taking corrective action, she isolated the hydraulic systems and placed the A-10 into the manual reversion flight control mode of flight and prepared for the long and tenuous return flight to Kuwait.

Captain Campbell’s aviation prowess and coolness under pressure directly contributed to the successful comletion of the critical mission and recovery of a valuable combat aircraft. The outstanding heroism and selfless devotion to duty displayed by Captain Campbell reflect great credit upon herself and the United States Air Force.

Air Force

3/29/2004 – WASHINGTON — The Iraqi republican guard may have had luck on their side that miserable Baghdad day, but they did not know who was flying the A-10 Thunderbolt II they had just hit with a rocket.

It was April 7, 2003, and an elite unit of Iraqis had U.S. forces pinned down along the Tigris River, firing rocket-propelled grenades into their position, not far from the North Baghdad Bridge. The word from the forward-air controller on the ground with the U.S. forces indicated assistance was needed immediately.

Capt. Kim Campbell of the 75th Fighter Squadron, speaking to a large crowd at the Smithsonian Institution’s Air and Space Museum on March 24, said she knew there would be considerable risk involved in the mission. But she said that it is the nature of the beast for an A-10 attack pilot.

“These guys on the ground needed our help,” said the captain. “That’s our job — to bring fire down on the enemy when our Army and Marine brothers request our assistance.”

The day’s mission had not been ideal by any means. Once she and her flight leader were airborne, with instructions to target Iraqi vehicles and tanks in the city, they had trouble finding the tanker for gas, because of inclement weather conditions in the area. Before leaving Kuwait, the weather prompted Captain Campbell’s flight leader, who was also her squadron commander, to ask if she had her lucky rabbit’s foot.

“I did not know how much luck I would later need,” she told the Smithsonian crowd.

As soon as the call for close-air support came through, Captain Campbell said she knew the two planes would be over the target area within minutes. The pilots kept their planes above the weather as long as possible before descending in time to identify both the friendly and enemy locations. Then they unleashed their fury, beginning with the flight lead applying his 30 mm cannon on the enemy, and ending with both pilots making several passes, firing both cannon and explosive rockets.

Captain Campbell was leaving the target following her last rocket pass when she felt and heard a large explosion at the back of the aircraft. There was no question in her mind, she said, that the plane had been hit by enemy fire.

“The jet rolled fairly violently to the left and pointed at the city below, and the jet was not responding to any of my control inputs,” she said. “I had several caution lights, but the ones that stood out in my mind the most were the hydraulic lights. I checked the hydraulic gauges and both read zero.”

With both hydraulic lines gone, the only option was to put the jet into “manual inversion,” a system of cranks and cables that allows the pilot to fly the aircraft under mechanical control. The captain said she saw it as her last chance to avoid a parachute ride down into the city.

It was a huge relief, she said, when the jet started to climb out and away from Baghdad. But that relief was short-lived. She still had to maneuver the plane back to Kuwait, much of the way through hostile territory.

“I knew that if I had to eject, my chances of survival and rescue would be much better if I could get out of the city,” she said. “As we started maneuvering south to get out of Baghdad, we noticed that anti-aircraft artillery was coming at us from several locations.”

With little control to keep the jet moving in the manual inversion configuration, Captain Campbell said she could only hope for the best.

“I was hoping that the theory of big sky, little bullet would work out in my favor,” she told the crowd. “Amazingly, we made it out of Baghdad with no further battle damage.”

The design of the A-10 restricts how much the pilot can see of the rear portion of the jet, so Captain Campbell was limited to her flight lead’s description of the damage to her aircraft. His words were not encouraging.

“He did an initial battle-damage check and told me that I had hundreds of small holes in the fuselage and tail section on the right side, as well as a football-sized hole in the right horizontal stabilizer,” she said. “I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but I knew that that didn’t sound great.”

Soon thereafter, the captain began the long process of going through several emergency checklists. She said she had a decision to make — stay with the jet and try to land, or get to friendly territory and eject. Pilots do not train very often in manual inversion — only once during initial training to find out how the jet will respond, she said. In fact, one of the items on the checklist is to “attempt manual inversion landings only under ideal conditions,” she said. Still, Captain Campbell said she was confident she was going to get the jet back safely on the ground.

“I felt that I had a lot of things going my way that day,” she said. “The jet was flying extremely well, the winds at our home base were down the runway, and I had a very experienced flight lead on my wing, providing me with mutual support.”

At the same time, the captain also said that A-10 manual-inversion landings had been attempted three times during Operation Desert Storm, and not all had been successful. One pilot had been killed when his jet crashed, and one survived after touching down only to find out that his jet had no brakes.

“The trip back to Kuwait was probably one of the longest hours of my life,” she said. “I didn’t know exactly what was going to happen when I slowed the aircraft down in an attempt to land.”

After she completed the emergency-gear extension, the gear came down with three green-light indicators, telling Captain Campbell that the gears were down and locked. Now it was just a matter of flying the aircraft through the continual haze of dust storms associated with Kuwait. The pilots contacted the tower and the supervisor of flying to say they were on the way in.

As Captain Campbell started on final approach, the aircraft was flying extremely well, she said. But, as the A-10 crossed the landing threshold, the aircraft started a quick roll to the left. The captain quickly counteracted that with flight controls, and the A-10 touched down.

“When all three wheels hit the ground, it was an amazing feeling of relief, but I still had to get the jet stopped,” she said. “So I accomplished the procedure for emergency braking, and once again, that jet worked as advertised.”

Looking back on the ordeal, Captain Campbell said she has nothing but kind words for those responsible for building the A-10, and for those responsible for maintaining it.

“I am incredibly thankful to those who designed and built the A-10 as well as the maintainers who did their part to make sure that that jet could fly under any circumstances, even after extensive battle damage,” she said.

Captain Campbell told the Smithsonian crowd that experts believe a surface-to-air missile hit near the right rear stabilizer, a missile fired without the aid of any type of navigation system — it was a lucky shot.

But that luck pales in comparison to the good fortune of Captain Campbell’s A-10. Thanks to her, the plane has since found a nice resting place amongst the heroes of days gone by — in the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz. — instead of becoming a burning heap of metal in Iraq.

British Distinguished Flying Cross [presented by the Queen herself!!!!]

UPDATE: From Invincible Armor comes this suggestion – I am recommending Major Chesarek and his incredible story to Charlie Gibson’s “Person of the Week” segment on ABC.

YOU can do the same by going here: ABC

Marines

The Queen of England presented the United Kingdom’s Distinguished Flying Cross to Maj. William D. Chesarek Jr., during an Investiture Ceremony held at Buckingham Palace, here March 21.

Chesarek, an AH-1W Super Cobra helicopter pilot, was recognized for his service as an exchange officer serving with the U. K.’s 847th Naval Air Squadron, Commando Helicopter Force during combat operations in Iraq in 2006. The award is a level three award for gallantry in the air while on active operation against the enemy and according to the U. K.’s Ministry of Defense office, this is first time this is being presented to an American service member since actions in World War II.

According to the U.K. award citation, during operations in the vicinity of Al Amarah on June 10-11, 2006, Chesarek, flying a Lynx AH7 helicopter, was providing communications relay support to the U.K.’s ground forces during a company sized search operation when the unit encountered insurgents armed with small arms and Rocket Propelled Grenades.

To assist the unit, Chesarek flew in to spot enemy fire and due to being trained as an airborne forward air controller he was able to coordinate, designate and control fixed wing assets in conducting close air support which resulted in dispersing the insurgents.

Additionally the citations states, being the only rotary winged aircraft in the area, Chesarek landed his helicopter adjacent to the scene and extracted a U.K. troop with a life threatening injury. Chesarek then flew the casualty to Shaibah Logistics Base and is credited with saving the life of the wounded soldier in addition to aiding in the safe extraction of the company.

“I am greatly honored and would like to accept this prestigious award for 847 NAS in memory of Lt. Cdr. Darren Chapman RN, Capt. David Dobson AAC, and Marine Paul Collins RM who were killed in action over Basrah in May 2006,” said Chesarek. “The awarded actions were only possible due to the combined effort of my combat crew; Lt. David Williams RN and Lance Cpl. Max Carter RM. My greatest sense of achievement that day is in knowing the ground troops all made it home.”

Stars & Stripes

A U.S. Marine helicopter pilot who helped save a British marine’s life in Iraq was awarded the British Distinguished Flying Cross on Wednesday, the first time an American has received the honor since World War II.

In a Buckingham Palace ceremony in London, Queen Elizabeth II pinned the medal on U.S. Marine Maj. William D. Chesarek Jr. He has served as the weapons and tactics instructor with the British 847 Naval Air Squadron since 2005 as part of an exchange program between the two countries.

His actions during a deployment last year to the British area of operations in Iraq, centered in the southern city of Basra, were cited in receiving the prestigious award, roughly the equivalent of the American Silver Star.

The mission started late on the night of June 10, 2006, as Chesarek and his crew were preparing to support about 100 British marines from the 20 Armoured Brigade as they looked for an insurgent weapons cache in the city of Amarah.

He was piloting a Lynx AH47 helicopter, which usually supported each battle group of a few hundred British troops.

As the ground force prepared to leave Amarah after wrapping up the weapons search, one vehicle became disabled. And insurgents took advantage.

“It kind of delayed the process, and now it’s going from night to day,” Chesarek, 32, recalled. “They started taking more fire as well.”

While Chesarek and his men in the air tried to find the sources of insurgent attacks — he estimated it was the work of five to 10 groups of three to five men — civilians started emerging, making it more difficult for the helicopter to single out and fire back at the insurgents.

“Obviously that has a huge impact on everything the guys on the ground are doing, as far as trying to avoid anything with noncombatants, and trying to effectively engage insurgents,” Chesarek said.

As the summer sun got higher in the sky, attacks on the marooned ground forces increased, and one British marine was shot in the head. Chesarek and his crew landed and evacuated the casualty.

Chesarek also drew enemy fire away from the ground troops and called in other air support that helped disperse the insurgents.

As the chopper pulled away from the scene, a rocket-propelled grenade barely missed its tail.

Though he had supported U.S. Marines on similar missions, those close calls never stop feeling too close for comfort, he said.

“I had been through some scenarios which age you significantly,” he said. “You’re that much more prepared for it when it happens again, and you’re grateful when it misses you. I remember looking behind me in the face of my door gunner and laughing briefly at the expression on his face just after that barely missed.”

Chesarek, of Newport, R.I., is the first American to receive the medal since World War II, according to David Stevens, a British Ministry of Defence representative.

Chesarek, who is an AH-1W Super Cobra helicopter pilot for the U.S. Marines, was modest about the honor.

“It was very good, the ceremony was pretty neat,” he said after Wednesday’s ceremony. “[The queen] asked about the exchange program and being with one of her naval squadrons, as far as my experiences. She was basically saying ‘good job.’ ”