Fall of Saigon
On Tuesday, April 29th, 1975, the usually crowded streets of Saigon were empty except for military personnel and ambulances. The previous day’s attack by North Vietnamese forces at Tan Son Nhat airport has left the city in a 24-hour lockdown.
Evacuation Orders for Americans and Southern Sympathizers
With communist forces pressing in on downtown Saigon, the order to evacuate American nationals and South Vietnamese sympathizers was given.
The original plan was to bus the evacuees to Tan Son Nhat airport, until it too came under fire by the communist’s building offensive. Journalists filming the air attacks witnessed a North Vietnamese helicopter go down by the Presidential Palace. At least ten people died in the crash.
American ambassador Graham Martin took personal control of the evacuation. Amidst tremendous confusion and a total breakdown in military protocol, a steady procession of helicopters began landing within the relative safety of the walled American Embassy compound.
Frightened civilians were airlifted to the American aircraft carriers Hancock and Midway waiting some 40 miles offshore, ferried by a dedicated task force of some 80 American helicopters. Many of the surviving evacuees recalled that the most unnerving part was waiting for a ride to safety, all the while hearing artillery fire in the near distance, which only amplified their fears that the airlift would suddenly come to end should the communist overtake the city.
Besides the 80 American helicopters shuttling people to safety, South Vietnamese helicopter pilots flew their families to safety aboard the carriers as well, but lacking the space on the flight decks to stow their aircraft, the pilots were forced to ditch in the ocean ships pushed into the sea.
Saved From The Fall of Saigon
In all, approximately 7,000 people, most of them Vietnamese, were airlifted to safety during the twelve-hour operation known as Frequent Wind. Desperate Vietnamese who failed to make the cut stayed at the embassy gates well into the night, desperately appealing for a Hail Mary, last-minute evacuation, but for them, there was to be no mercy from the impending communist takeover.
As the last of the Marines took to the rooftop of the embassy in hopes of their own Hail Mary evacuation, North Vietnamese tanks and troop carriers rolled into the city. The last of the Marines were finally airlifted from the rooftop, just as the communists stormed the compound gate.