So That Others May Live
A Medic's Battle To Save Lives
by
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Next to me Dave leaned forward, swinging his sixty back and forth, scanning the jungle. I knelt by the hoist, leaning out the door. I put my left hand on it to steady myself. In my right hand I held the hoist control. I ran the cable down through the trees, making sure that it didn''t get tangled or snagged. The JP made it all the way down. The moment it touched the ground all hell broke loose. Everything happened at once. Reality went into slow motion starting with machine gun fire. It was so loud it sounded like it was right next to me. I looked up, assuming Dave had opened up, but it wasn''t him. As I glanced at him he started firing. I turned and looked behind me. Right behind my legs I saw a dozen small holes across the brand new aluminum floor. We''d been hit! Mike fired his gun on the other side. In that instant, something hit me in the back of the neck. I slapped my hand on the spot and when I pulled it back, I could see small flecks of red covering my hand.
"Shit, I''m hit, I''m hit!" I hollered on the radio. I turned to look at the pilots and saw the windshield had a line of bullet holes across it.
"MAY DAY! MAY DAY! This is medevac One Niner, were going down." When I heard Charlie, it was if an electric shock swept through my body, panic and disbelief competing for control.
The machine gun fire continued as the helicopter, which was now shaking violently, began to slip down and to the left. As my senses came back I realized that the cable was still out with the JP dangling like a hook. If it got caught in a tree it could pull us right out of the air. I grabbed the hoist control and looked down while thumbing the trigger hard to bring the JP back up. I could see it swinging wildly below us as the ship continued its left-hand turn.
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About the Book
D.T. McGuff has crafted a deft account of his struggles as a combat medic in
So That Others May Live chronicles the strangely compelling adventures and personal struggles of a nineteen year old caught up in a battle to save human lives in a world bent on destroying them. This painfully honest account of the mind-blowing roll of a combat medic takes you on a terrifying, confusing and sometimes humorous journey that depicts how one American son evolves from naive nineteen year old to disillusioned combat veteran.
About the Author
In the years following his service Dale was forced to fight another battle with depression, nightmares and a feeling of being disconnected from the world. It took years to realize that he was in the grip of Post Traumatic Stress from his experience in
Dale found his way to
Dale currently lives with his wife Debra and there two cats in