page_title: USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19)
section_title: 1975 WestPac III
hierarchical_section_title: USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19) / History / 1975 WestPac III
caption_attribution_description: English: WYSWYG Late in March and late in Blue Ridge's third WestPac, the military and political situation in Cambodia and South Vietnam had BR's operational plans in confusion as it was in the late March of 1972. The military advances of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and the NVN proxies in South Vietnam were foreshadowing their eventual fate. The beginning of the end: "The massive influx of civilian refugees into the Da Nang area precipitated a breakdown in law and order. ... on 30 March, that former bastion of American firepower fell to the Communists. ... collapsed without a shot being fired. ... Responsibility for this disaster would be laid at the doorstep of President Thieu. The catastrophic chain of events leading to the surrender of Da Nang resulted directly from the decision to abandon Military Region 2 and the ill-advised withdrawal of the Airborne Division from Military Region 1. ... [74] During the two-week period that Military Region I came apart at the seams, the United States took notice and decided to take action. ... The Marines of the III Marine Amphibious Force were the first to experience the effects of this reaction. ... The command had been concentrating its efforts on Eagle Pull with its sights set on the almost inevitable evacuation of Cambodia. The events in South Vietnam quickly rewrote the script and seemed to indicate that the III Marine Amphibious Force might have to double load its gun and do so without delay! " [75] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=USS_Blue_Ridge_(LCC-19)&amp;oldid=611915045
context_page_description: USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19) is the first of the two Blue Ridge-class amphibious command ships of the United States Navy, and is the flagship of the Seventh Fleet. Her primary role is to provide command, control, communications, computers, and intelligence support to the commander and staff of the United States Seventh Fleet. She is currently forward-deployed to U.S. Navy Fleet Activities, Yokosuka in Japan, and is the third Navy ship named after the Blue Ridge Mountains, a range of mountains in the Appalachian Mountains of the eastern United States. Blue Ridge is the oldest deployable warship of the U.S. Navy, following the decommissioning of USS Denver. Blue Ridge, as the U.S. Navy's active commissioned ship having the longest total period as active, flies the First Navy Jack instead of the Jack of the United States. Blue Ridge is expected to remain in service until 2039.
context_section_description: Late in March 1975 and late in Blue Ridge's third WestPac, the deteriorating military and political situation in Cambodia and South Vietnam disrupted Blue Ridge's operational plans as had occurred in late March 1972.
   
   
  Blue Ridge was at White Beach, Okinawa when the 9th MAB was alerted on 25 March 1975 for immediate departure to Da Nang to reinforce U.S. facilities, but Blue Ridge did not get underway for Vietnam until 27 March. Marines and sailors hastily trained for crowd control, evacuation procedures, and a Vietnamese orientation course. The printing section on board the Blue Ridge reproduced thousands of signs in Vietnamese including a simplified instruction card for the small unit leader that included basic Vietnamese phrases and human relations oriented "do's and don'ts. However North Vietnamese forces captured Da Nang on 29 March.
  On 12 April, in response to the Cambodian government's crumbling defenses around the capital of Phnom Penh, Operation Eagle Pull evacuated 289 Americans, Cambodians and third country nationals by helicopter to the USS Okinawa.
   
  After the end of the Battle of Xuân Lộc on 21 April, President Thieu resigned and fled into exile and North Vietnamese forces surrounded Saigon. The fixed wing evacuation from Tan Son Nhut Airport was halted by North Vietnamese artillery fire on the morning of 29 April and the helicopter evacuation Operation Frequent Wind commenced. Admiral Gayler directed USSAG/Seventh Air Force and Seventh Fleet to begin Frequent Wind Option IV at 10:51 (Saigon time), but for some unexplainable reason, dissemination of this message to the participating units had been delayed from 10:52 until 12:15. Evacuation helicopters finally departed with the first wave started landing at 15:06 and returning to fleet at 15:40 with the first load of evacuees.
   
  The commanding officer of ProvMAG 39. Colonel McLenon, exercised control of his Marine aircraft through the Tactical Air Coordination Center (TACC) on board the Blue Ridge. The Helicopter Direction Center on board the Okinawa, maintained aircraft spacing and routing. The primary difference between TACC and HDC was that TACC controlled the tactical disposition of the helicopters and HDC controlled the helicopters as long as they were in the Navy's airspace. These areas of responsibility often overlapped and at times even merged. Under the conditions existing on the morning of 29 April 1975, the difference in control responsibilities of TACC and HDC at best seemed blurred, at worst redundant. Coordination and control of the overall embarkation operation suffered from more serious communication problems. Direct communications with Admiral Whitmire and 9th MAB Rear were sporadic, at best, requiring a continuous relay by the C-130 Airborne Battlefield Command and Control Center.
   
  The sky over the evacuation fleet was soon filled with Republic of Vietnam Air Force (RVNAF) helicopters, looking for a place to land and unload their passengers. Five helicopters crashed on the ship that day, not counting ones ditched or abandoned overboard. One crashed, causing a near disaster and showering the ship and personnel with debris. An NBC film crew, with reporter George Lewis, filmed this unexpected arrival of RVNAF helicopters on the flight deck of Blue Ridge, showing the processing of the refugees and two helicopters' rotor blades colliding. To free up space on the flight deck, RVNAF helicopters were ditched by their pilots in the South China Sea after unloading their refugees on ship. Along with the widely-published photo of an RVNAF UH-1 Huey being pushed over the side of Blue Ridge, they filmed one unknown crew member being tossed into a flight deck safety net by the movement of the chopper going over the side.
  The evacuation continued until the morning of 30 April with the last helicopter evacuating the Marine Security Guards from the roof of the US Embassy at 07:53 and landing on USS Okinawa at 08:30. At 11:30 North Vietnamese tanks smashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace less than 1 km from the Embassy and raised the flag of t
caption: USN ship disposition in WestPac at the beginning
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