Cue, ‘Fortunate Son’…
I recently hit the road in southwest Alabama and visited the U.S. Army Aviation Museum, one of the largest military helicopter collections in the world.
Located at Fort Novosel (formerly Fort Rucker, aka “Mother Rucker”), the sprawling 60,000-acre complex has been home to all Army helicopter training since 1959 and all aviation training since 1973.
The Museum has over 250 aircraft in its inventory – some incredibly rare.
The post earlier this year was named in honor of Army CWO Michael J. Novosel, a UH-1 medevac pilot who evacuated an amazing 5,589 wounded personnel while in Vietnam, earning a well-deserved Medal of Honor.
While I have a full 15-minute video and lots of images over in my column at GDC, these two struck me as appropriate for today.
In a sobering display, a downed Huey is shown in the center of the museum’s main gallery.
The Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association estimates over 3,300 UH-1 models were lost either due to combat or accidents during the war.