Catkillers

Excerpts from the new book Catkillers
by Jim Hooper

20 Nov. 2000

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The chapters that will appear on this website over the next few months are excerpted from a work-in-progress by Jim Hooper entitled CATKILLERS. The mission accounts are as accurate as memory and official records from the National Archives permit. Given the 30-year hiatus between their occurrence and the writing of CATKILLERS, however, it obviously has been necessary to reconstruct dialogue, as well as ground unit call signs. Fast-mover call signs are real, but individual tail numbers should not be construed as accurate.

The author has given the Bird Dog website his permission for the one-time use of selected chapters from CATKILLERS. They may not be reproduced, printed, or otherwise disseminated by any other persons or organizations without the express permission of the author, Jim Hooper, who holds the copyright.

For the purposes of explanation and clarity the mission accounts presented here do not follow the same sequence as found in CATKILLERS, and thus are not in chronological order.

CATKILLERS

113362.1417@compuserve.com

Bill Hooper, receiving the Silver Star for his actions supporting a U.S. batallion which had been ambushed by an NVA regiment in the DMZ.

Bill Hooper was drafted at the end of his first year in college. He attended OCS at Ft Sill, Oklahoma, and a year later volunteered for flight school. He arrived in the Republic of Vietnam in June, 1968, and was assigned to the 21st Reconnaissance Airplane Company (‘Black Aces’), headquartered at Chu Lai. Flying with the 3rd Platoon out of Quang Ngai, he soon earned an Air Medal with V (for Valor) Device, but his appetite for action saw him request and receive reassignment to the legendary Catkillers in September. In March, 1969, he was medevacked after being badly wounded while running air and artillery strikes against an NVA weapons cache in the DMZ. After spending a year in and out of the hospital having his right arm rebuilt, he returned to college and finished with a Masters Degree in Ocean Engineering. Today, he’s a successful businessman in Clearwater, Florida.