On this day in 1968, RT Alabama was inserted into Laos with 1-0 Jim Stride, 1-1 Steve Engelke, and 1-2 Lynne Black

As the helicopter was coming in, Black noticed an NVA flag flying which told him there was a large NVA base camp nearby. Stride ignored the request to abort (1/6)

The team was on the ground with the point man Hoa leading the way and 1-0 Stride not far behind

While walking along a low spot, they were caught in the middle of an elevated L shaped ambush. Stride was killed along with the point man Hoa (2/6) 

1-2 Lynne Black was forced to take over the team as it seemed the 1-1 was also killed in the ambush

While he was getting the team ready to charge through one side of the ambush, Lynne notice the 1-1 was still alive. He was curled up in ball begging God to take him home (3/6) 

On his first mission in SOG, Lynne and his interpreter Khanh Doan, were able to organize his team and break the initial ambush

As they made there way through, several of the indigenous team members were wounded including Khanh, they all continued to fight (4/6) 

Lynne and RT Alabama would come up against a total of roughly 10,000 NVA soldiers who came wave after wave constantly throughout the day of October 5th

As they killed wave after wave, they would drag the bodies back to their perimeter and use them as sandbags (5/6) 

The team would eventually extract from the area thanks to the 37th ARR who sent 2 Jolly Green Giant HH-3E helicopters

One was shot down on the 2nd extraction attempt, 2 men were killed and were never recovered. The remaining crew was taken out with RT Alabama (6/6) 

This story is covered in detail in Lynne’s book, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. It’s my favorite SOG book and would recommended to everyone.

Read the alt caption to the picture to get all the names of the indigenous men who were on Alabama that day.