THIS PAGE IS BROUGHT TO YOU

BY DENNIS PANKONIN (DOC)

C. CO. 577th Eng. Bn. 18th Eng.Bde

CONTACT DOC AT DOC

<>My name is Denny Pankonin. I met Cecil through his website, and he was nice enough to offer me a web page for medics on his site. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you, Cecil, for your generosity, and for creating a website for the 577th and all other veterans who happen to stop by.

<>I was a Medic with the 577th Engineers, Cco. Duc Trong, Vietnam 69-70. The following is a brief history of my tour in Vietnam. I feel ready to share my experiences, and hopefully it will inspire others to share theirs too.

<>It’s February 1969. I found myself drafted by the US Army, and doing eight weeks basic training at Fort Lewis, WA. Upon graduating, I was in the top 10 percent of my class, and made E-2. When my orders came down for AIT, mine were for Ft Sam Houston Medical Training where I would spend the 10 weeks learning how to save lives.

<>I studied hard to become the best Medic I could be. I finished in the top 10 percent of my class again, and made PFC. I was feeling pretty good about life, until I got my orders for my next duty station, “Vietnam”. You don’t really get the full meaning of what’s to come, until you see Your name and Vietnam in Bold print! I had a whole eleven days to say goodbye to my family. I thought, man, they must need Medics pretty bad, to cut my leave this short!

<>Here I am, a nineteen year old farm kid from a small town in Minnesota. I had never even been on an airplane before, and now I’m sitting on this plane with nothing to do with my time but think about where I’m going and wondering what the hell I had gotten myself into. On approach to the Bin Hoa Air Base, I heard some scuttlebutt about the runway getting hit while previous flights were trying to land. I thought, I’m not even gonna get on the ground before somebody try’s to take me out! Luckily we didn’t have that misfortune.

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