Vet reflects on Babylift

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Amber Carter
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  Towards the end of the Vietnam War, a plan to transport thousands of displaced Vietnamese orphans to the United States commenced. Airmen from Travis Air Force Base, California, took part in the mission that is now known as Operation Babylift.

The first plane, carrying more than 100 orphans left Saigon-Tan Son Nhut Airport on April 4, 1975, just a few weeks before the fall of Saigon, which symbolized the end of the Vietnam War.

The C-5A Galaxy had a door malfunction causing the plan to crash into a rice paddy only minutes after takeoff. The lives that were taken during that crash would affect many and live on in the minds of those closest to them.

"The Sunday before the crash, an Airman called the office saying he was sick and wouldn't make the flight," said Jeff Krohn, former 10th Aeromedical Evacuation ground supply technician and Air Force veteran. "So they called my friend, Mike (Paget) up and told him he would have to fly out to the Philippines."

Air Force Staff Sergeant Mike Paget was a former 10th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron medical technician.

Krohn, a Wisconsin native, and Paget, born in Canada and resident of California, first met at the barracks near David Grant USAF Medical Center, when it was located in Bldg. 381.

"I arrived at Travis brand new out of tech school as an Airman and somehow managed to get my own room," Krohn said with a chuckle. "Mike (Paget), a staff sergeant who had already flown all over, had a roommate he didn't care for and said, 'You have your own room and I'm rooming with this lunk head? Do you mind if I room with you?'

I said, 'Heck no, come on over.' We got along really well. He even let my girlfriend, (now wife of more than 40 years), and I drive around in his car when she came to visit me."

He would use the same car to transport Mike to the airport the last time he saw him alive.

"He got his stuff ready and I drove him down to the squadron in his car," Krohn said. "On that Thursday night, they scrambled the on-call crew, sent the flight into Saigon for the first airlift out and it ended up crashing."

According to an article titled Operation Babylift in the 2005 Spring edition of Airlift/Tanker Quarterly, at 3 p.m. on April 4, 1975, the initial mission flight took off with Capt. Dennis "Bud" Traynor as the captain of the C-5A Galaxy. It crashed minutes later.

According to NPR.org, out of the more than 300 people on board, the death toll included 78 children and 50 adults, including Air Force personnel and Staff Sergeant Mike Paget. Many lost their lives that day. However, the quick response of Capt. Dennis Traynor allowed for more than 170 survivors.

Paget's body was recovered and sent back to the states.

"I was only an Airman at the time and normally you have to be equal or higher rank to escort a body home," Krohn said. "His family requested that I do it and, a week or so later, I met the casket in Oakland, California. I took it down to Los Angeles, where I had planned to stay in a hotel until the funeral. His family found out and said, 'No way! You are staying with us.' They basically adopted my (now) wife and I."

When complete, Operation Babylift saved more than 2,500 orphans from Vietnam by safely transporting them to the United States and other countries.

Jeff Krohn and his wife Barbara visited Travis Jan. 12 for the first time since Krohn left the Air Force, after serving his four-year enlistment.

"The base has changed a lot," Krohn said. "Losing Mike is still one of my most prominent memories of serving at Travis."