The October Flood: 1969


by Doc Dave Pfeifer
THANKS MJR,to be sharp enough to notice, that the story 'the folks perception', is the lead in to the 'October flood story. For all others who either weren't there or didn't see it, please read the folks perception story first then this one.----PART 2


THE OCTOBER FLOOD 1969


A fter staring out at the rain from our litle tents made from ponchos, we tried sleeping, with the hope the rain would stop.It continued to pour down on us.Early evening we awoke with the water coming into our tents about ankle deep,and staring to float our air matresses. getting outside quickly to see all the guys standing outside in ankle deep water,muttering about what are we gonna do now?

Looking up at the sky it was still rainung but not as hard.ALL we could do is stand there and pray it would stop raining soon.We tried our two radios,and they squacked and made static but we couldn't raise anyone.We weren't getting out.Well, our platoon strength was twenty-eight men. We looked pretty wet and sorry standing and shivering on that small knoll.As I looked around I kept saying how amazing it was for that much water to raise about 8 feet above the rice paddies to flood our little knoll above.By nine pm. it was waist deep and still raining.By now all twenty eight of us were huddled up into a small cicle on top of the knoll.The outside edges kept breaking down under our feet,from the weight of us.The water seemed to be flowing by us pretty fast and bringing with it trash and debris, like treelimbs and stuff.Some of us managed to save our gear by floating it on our air mattresses.More and more our gear floated away from us and our circle got tighter trying to stay on the knoll. One of the guys looked like he was coming down with pneumonia.

I worked my way around to him by hanging on to each of the guys as i circled to get to him.His head was down and he had a high fever,seezing and coughing.He had a soaking wet poncho liner wrapped around him, and me and his buck sgt. kept holding him up as he wanted to buckle in place.

By eleven o'clock the water was up to our chests and we all began to think that we were all going to drown.Suddenly the rain stopped and all the guys let out a cheer.We watched as a big full moon came out and cheered again ,it can't rain with the moon out like that. someone said,but nobody knew for sure.We were all struggling to hold on to each other in a circle ,28 of us trying to stay up and together.The debris continued to float towards us and we were fighting the big branches and the current.some of the red flashlites still worked as we used them to keep eye out on the stuff coming by us.We had lost most of our gear by now ,no way to hold on to each other and to our mattresses to.Slowly the water began to subside.

The buck sgt on the other side of the guy we were holding got my attention and pointed, there on our guys shoulder was one of the brightest lime green snake ,it was almost irridescent in the moon light.Together we counted one, two three,and snapped his poncholiner throwing the snake back into the water.Most of the guys yelled and started looking all around for that snake or anyothers.Our sick guy didn't even move the entire time,and by then probably didn't care any more because he felt so bad.Acouple hours passed and the water receded down to our waists and we started to the think we weregoing to make it.some of the guys made wise cracks that Charly was probably sitting on some fucking hill laughing their asses off, at these stupid gi's gonna drown themselves and not to waist any bullets on us.Then it began to sprinkle again, every one yelled oh,no! It can't rain with the full moon out,It and it did.It continued to sprinkle off and on all nite long ,so by morning it maintained the water level agout waist deep.Also the knoll we clung to kept braking down and getting smaller al nite.

At dawn we tried to fire some flares,only one of them fizzeled and burned but didn't get any altitude. The one radio we had left didn't make a sound any more.When suddenly, here comes one helicopter flying just a few feet above the water and turning towards us . yeah., horay.airborne ,everyone cheered and waved there arms ,and yelled. Black Widow had found us.After a short discussion with LT.,we decided to send the sick guy out first, and then we would wait for them to return for the rest of us.The buck sgt and I on each side of him, made our way down from the knoll to the level ground and bounced us and him thru the water toward the hovering chopper.

He had his skids in the water and the medic on board was leaning out the side door arms out and standing one foot on the skid in the water.Not realizing it as we bounced thru the water we came up on the edge of the rice paddies and I sank down over my head.Thank god the sarge had stopped and I struggled and pulled my way backup to level ground.We wre still about eight feet from the guy in the door. So we decided to turn our guy around backwards and sent him floatIng on his back towards the guy leaning out.Just as he ran out of momentem,and started to sink,the guy reached down and grabbed him and pulled him in.They waived and tookoff.We lnew itwould be awhile before theyed be back for the rest of us. but now, we knew thy knew where we were and would be back for us.We all started high five-ing and cheering ,we made it.The water continued to recede and got down to about our crotch level, by the time black widoc got back to load five of us at a time off the knoll.The LT. insisted he had to be the last man dff to ensure all his men got out safe.So I stayed with him,and by the time they got to us the water had gotten down to ankle level.As we got on the bird I asked the pilot why only one ship loaded us out ? He said weather conditions were so bad nothing was flying, only volunteer missions.

By the time we got back to sally the Dr. had decided to stand us all down with 28 cases of emersion foot for three days.And that my friends is the story of the october flood.

Doc Dave
Medic, Vietnam