Crew 20

Crew 20 Patrol Squadron Forty-Five. I flew with this crew from November 1968 until June 1969. We operated in Southeast Asia, flying on Operation Market Time missions. The mission’s intent was to block North Vietnamese ships from supplying their forces in the South. An airborne barrier flown by Navy P-3 Orion Patrol planes was the mainstay of the Market Time Mission. Patrol squadrons provided five flights a day.  Our patrols provided 24-hours a day, seven-days-a-week coverage. From December 1968 until May 1969, Crew 20 flew these day and night, ten-hour missions. In those six months, we flew more than 600 hours to support US operations in Vietnam.

In the airplane we were a single crew. We trained, operated, and identified as one unit. We depended on each other to accomplish each flight safely.  Each crew member played a unique role that integrated into fulfillment of the airplane’s mission.  Flight crews shared a closeness and familiarity not found in other officer-enlisted relationships.  When the door closed, addressing an enlisted aircrew member by their rank and name, disappeared. So did the “Yes, sir” and “No, sir” enlisted-to-officer exchanges. We never degenerated to a first-name basis, but nicknames ruled the day in the airplane. Soupy, Frenchy, Julie, Spooks became individual call signs.  We got close to our crew and developed a comfort zone flying with the same  people.  Crewmember substitutions were rare.  But if a normal member was missing, we became superstitious, and our comfort zone contracted. 

Because our missions were so long, we always flew with an augmented crew. We carried extra pilots and flight engineers for these extended duty days. Fortunately for me, our Patrol Plane Commander was the Squadron Executive Officer. Because of his ground and administrative duties, he did not fly with our crew all the time, and I got more flight time.  Never in my Navy career did I encounter a crew as close-knit as Crew 20 during those six months of flying missions around Vietnam.  The memories of those days still fill my mind. The six months from December 1968 until May 1968 are an unmatched time of my life.    

Shown in the photo is our crew which was a composite of Americans who came from all over the US. 

Back row Left to right. 

AO-2 Tommy Ussery, Ordnance, Florida

AW-2 William “Soupy” Campbell, Radar Operator, MAD, Pennsylvania

AW-3 John Messeder, Acoustic Data Processor (Jezebel), New York

ADR-1 Frank Lorentzen, Crew Chief, First Flight Engineer, Iowa

AWC Thelbert Hartley, In flight electronic repair, California

AW-3 Sam Hughston, ECM, Explosive Echo Ranging (Juile),  Texas

RM-1 Jim Springer, Radio Operator, Florida

ADJ-2 Rene “Frenchy” Lavigne, second Flight Engineer, Massachusetts

Front Row Left to right.

LT Bob Hartl, second pilot, PPC, Kansas

LT Bill Dailey, First TACCO, Florida

CRD Ralph Mason, PPC, New York

LCDR Tom Leshko, Second TACCO, Second Nav, Pennsylvania

Randy Hotton, First Nav, third pilot, Michigan