These pictures are courtesy of Larry Williams, Raven 72
New Oct 2011
See attached pics. of a Russiam 37mm tracer shell head I saved. I asked the RLA guys at LS53 to get me one to look at since I was curious how they were made. They stated that it came from an operation in the vicinity of Mahaxai and, since it took a considerable amount of time after I made the request before I received it, I have no idea when it was "captured". The case and all of the explosive charge and tracer were removed when I received it in the late fall of 1971. I left the quarter in the pics. for size reference-37mm is approximately 1.45 inches.
New Aug 2010
See attached scanned slides from early 1972 (probably the middle of Feb.).
Shortly after Max arrived to replace me I requested permission from AIRA to drive north from Vientiane to the Nam Ngum river because I had never had an opportunity to drive any distance on local roads in Laos. There was a 25 K no fire zone (by mutual agreement between the two ruling brother's warring contingents) around the city center and we had to obtain permission from the embassy before we could go outside that limit.
They finally agreed and I got an unmarked car for the trip. Max and two CIA types (I remember their names) filled the other three seats on the trip. Just south of the river we spotted the coke ovens in the pics. and couldn't resist stopping. At that time Laos had no reliable source of local fuel besides their forests. The local trees have a thick resin type sap that takes years to "cure" and they shunned using fresh cut timber because it blackened their pots. Also the volatile resin filled smoke from fresh cut timber (teak/mahogany) was somewhat toxic if it condensed on any cooking food. They did this on a much smaller scale at LS53.
The first question I had was why have coke ovens underneath highly flamable thatched sheds. They indicated they had to have coke to sale all year long and during the rainy season the mud seal covering was washed away, filled the underground breathers and drowned the coking embers.
The timber sections were "ricked" in a circular dome shape with underground breather "sprues" to a point into the middle of the pile. Tinder was placed in the sprue breathers and the breathers and ricked wood was covered with rocks stacked up and over the rick before they were covered with mud from the river. Sprue tinder was lit and the air (combustion oxygen) to the wood was controlled by opening or closing the sprue breathers. When the volatile smoke quit coming out the breathers, the coke was ready and the filled the sprues with water which created steam and quenched the coke. Once the pile cooled they broke away the mud'rock covering and sold the coke.
It took a week or so for the volatile resin to be burned off this way (depending on the size of the rick) leaving only the fixed carbon (charcoal).
The last time Max and I were at the same reunion I remember seeing similar pictures to these in an album that he brought to the reunion.
(I'm sorry guys-I only meant to write a couple of lines !!!!!) but after I looked at the pics. I thought they needed some explanation.
I took the attached three scanned slides at LP about two weeks before I rotated back to the states in early march 1972. There was a shop downtown just southeast of Phou Si (?) hill that made good quality silver jewelry, bowls, candle holders, etc. I went in to buy my wife some things before I left and took my Canon F-1 with me. I was amazed to see the word "thinner" in English when I looked at the slides back in the states because I don't remember noticing it when I took the pic.
When I look at these pics, I have difficulty reminding myself that they are over 38 years old ------------until I look in the mirror !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Lloyd's note: Here are a couple of items from the shop. The Zippo lighter I used for years until I stopped smoking 15 years ago, and the travel stick the MR1 Lao General gave me for a present when I left.
Quite some time back I told you I had some additional Raven pics. that I found with the originals which you put on our web site. Well I finally got the additional ones scanned and I'll send them to you piecemeal periodically. I'll leave it up to you to filter out the ones that may be of no interest to those viewing our web site.
The Meo Village pic. was taken near the end of my Raven tour not too far from LS53. I took it because of the resourcefullness the villagers exhibited in getting "fresh water" to their village. A spring was located not far up in the hills above the village and the villagers took long length sections of large diameter bamboo, split them lenthwise, carved out the separator cell walls, layed them overlapping on the next lower section all the way down the hill to their village. If you look closely at the scanned slide, you can see the lengths of bamboo elevated on crossed supports. This gave them continuous running water even in the dry season when this was taken (there was no water to spare during the dry season at LS53).
They split the water supply many times through the village by letting an upstream section of bamboo feed into two downstream pieces which formed a "V". I remember the villiage chief had a section of the system which ran all the way through the lower end of his hootch which had an overlapping section inside. All he had to do to fill a container was to lift the upstream section out of the lower one and hold it over the container and put it back when he got what he wanted.
I really admired the way the remaining villagers carried on even though every male in the village between the age of 13 & 50 had gone off to fight at and around Alternate (Jan-Feb "72).
Vertical Runway
inside pictures of Vertical Runway
Previously published pictures from Larry
The picture's name is descriptive of what is in the picture
