A Recon Marine Remembers LZ Margo (continued)
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Puff Is Pretty Shooting At the Enemy
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At some point probably the night of the 16th or 17th Puff was called in for supporting fire. I remember watching with Rick (Imp) Imperiale and Mike Finkel as Puff swept the jungle with its mini guns.
Puff the Magic Dragon, also known as "Spooky", was a converted C47 cargo plane with enough Gatling-gun firepower to walk ribbons of fire down the night sky, (hopefully!) just outside the perimeter of the Marines crouched in fighting holes in the inky dark below. Photo courtesy of Pinterest.
Then the trail of tracers swept up toward our lines and we all knew they were going to be right on us. There was absolutely nothing to do but wait, the rounds hit right behind our hole. They struck a rock next to us and put five bullet holes in the poncho one of us was supposed to be resting in. They also put a hole in a canteen next to Dennis Everitt’s head who was a couple of holes down from us.
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By some miracle nobody was hit. Puff is mighty pretty when its shooting at the enemy not so much when you’re the target, accidentally or not.