Christina MacBride and Grady Jackson

[00:12] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: My name is Christina Jackson MacBride. I am 54 years old. Today's date is April 21, 2022. We are recording this in Washington, DC. I am interviewing my father, Grady Lee Jackson, and he is going to introduce himself.

[00:41] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Good morning. I'm Grady Jackson, and I am 82 years young. And today is April 21, 2022. And we're here in Washington, DC, and I'm with my daughter and driver, and I'll take care of her parents. Very well, Christina Jackson MacBride So it's a pleasure to be here.

[01:06] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Great. Well, dad, I thought this would be a good way to just get a really high quality recording of some of your cool stories from your time in the Navy. And so instead of starting at the beginning, I thought I would show you this.

[01:27] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I recognize that.

[01:28] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So I am putting on the table between us a tie. It's navy blue, and it's got a repeating red triangle pattern on it. And I'll start by saying that last May, when I moved you and mom from Annapolis to down the street from me in Falls Church, Virginia, about ten days after you guys moved, I was going through some of the boxes that ended up in my garage from your move, and I saw this tie. And it didn't look to me like the kind of ties you normally pick out. It's not colorful enough or silky enough, but it kind of caught my eye, and I flipped it over, and on the back of the tie, it says, jeeves and hawks, number one, Savile Row, London. And that got me even more intrigued because it just seemed like it was old. And I thought to myself, I wonder if this is Grandpa Shipley's tie. And maybe there was some London connection to Mallory company, where he worked for 30 years. So I texted you and I took a picture of the tie, and I texted you and mom, and I said, what's the deal with this tie? And then you texted me back something that I was really surprised to hear. So do you remember what you texted me back, or do you want to tell us about? You said, that is a tie worn by very few people in the world. You only get that tie when you make an emergency ejection from an airplane. And I was just wowed by that. And it happened to be about a week before Alistair graduated from 8th grade. And we had bought him a pinstripe suit for graduation, which is what he wanted, which was hilarious since most of the boys were wearing, like, blue blazers and khaki pants.

[03:46] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It would describe who Alastair is.

[03:48] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And Alistair is your grandson and my son. And a year ago, he was 14, going on 15 and graduating from a k through eight school, where they do a ceremony and all the kids get new outfits, the girls dresses and the boys a nice outfit. And he hadn't decided what kind of tie he was going to wear. And I showed it to him and I said, allie, this could look very cool with your pinstripe navy suit. And he ended up wearing it to his graduation. And so I. Dad, in a minute will have you tell the story of how you became a member of the thai club. But I'll just say this, that in the weeks following graduation, after Allie wore your tie and looked so handsome and you got to come, and we have a great picture of you and him that night, him wearing your tie. I will say that the ejection seat company in England is called Martin Baker, and they developed one of the first ejection seats following World War two. I think Korea might have been the first time that their ejection seats were used. It was definitely in the fifties that people started to survive plane crashes because of the Martin Baker ejection seats. And I went on their website and found out that, in fact, they give these ties to people who survive emergency ejections from aircrafts, and they call it the thai club. And on their website, you can go on and read the ejection stories of many men and women over the years. It's in the thousands now. And it's truly an amazing company because of what they do and because of the moms and dads and husbands and wives that they save. And I think about sometimes when I read interesting stories from World War two and think about how many people could have been saved that weren't. Because I don't think there were ejection seats in World War two.

[06:34] GRADY LEE JACKSON: No, I don't think so.

[06:36] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So one of my goals when I get a little time is to submit your ejection story to with your picture to Martin Baker so that you become, you're already an official member of the thai club and you have a number in their system, but it's up to us, your family, to submit a picture of you from that time, like from Vietnam, and a little write up about the night you ejected from your aircraft. So I am going to do that and put it on there. But I thought we'd start our conversation today just talking about that cool story about how I stumbled upon this tie. And I guess because I'm a bit of a curious person, it caught my eye. Plus, it's just from Saville Row, which I have learned through Neil MacBride my husband, is where all the bespoke handmade suits in London are made. Martin Baker obviously wanted the men and women. That's the other thing is I've been wondering.

[07:47] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I don't have one. I don't know.

[07:49] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: I have been meaning to reach out to Martin Baker and ask them, do women get ties, too, or do they give women, like, a scarf with a pattern on it? Because most women don't wear ties, but I bet they give them a scarf, I would guess, like a beautiful silk scarf and with that logo. So, yeah. So I guess I'll let you describe how you came to be a member of the thai club on that night in 1972, November 28. And I know that this November, now that we are now in the year 2022, this November will be the 50th anniversary of the night your plane crashed. And mom has been really good over many years of always emailing us or in recent years texting us to remind us on November 28 that it's the day that we give thanks that you are still here and that you've been here all these years. So if you want to tell us anything about the night that.

[09:20] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, it's a night that I will never forget, obviously. And it was. I was a bombardier navigator in VA 75, a six all weather night attack airplane flying from the Saratoga. And we were deployed at that time off of Vietnam and flying strike missions into North Vietnam, primarily. The a six was one of the major airplanes to fly into North Vietnam because of our ability to fly at low level at night. And it was a very survivable airplane. I flew with the commanding officer of the squadron, Commander Charlie Earnest, who was, at the time that he was, of our accident, had, I think I had 150 strike missions. He had 300. Some he had been in Vietnam before in a four. And then he came was to be CEO of our squadron. So he was a combat warrior, highly admired and respected by everybody in the squadron. And it was, what it shows you is that night is every. You react automatically or you don't have a chance of survival. So it's all the training that we go through in the Navy prepared me for that night, for that time to react. And the problem with the reason Charlie didn't have an opportunity to react, he was trying to save the airplane instead of saving himself. And then I later on, fought for an ability for the bombardier navigator, or an EA six B, the ECMO number one right next to it, who could see what was going on, knew what was going on, and he could initiate command ejection if he flew with somebody you were comfortable with, you would select command ejection. The guy in the right front seat could eject the pilot, which, if I could have ejected Charlie Ernst, he would have been saved. He would have had a better trajectory than I had. Because the airplane rolled right and I ejected out to the side.

[11:41] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: But at the time, they did not have that capability.

[11:46] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And that was one of the lessons learned from Vietnam. You need to be able to, particularly on a two seat airplane like that, where you could select. And if you're flying with somebody that was, you know, you were not comfortable with or didn't know you didn't. You didn't have to select that, right. It was selectable. So we flew at the same. We flew the same crew all the time.

[12:13] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: You and he were like.

[12:15] GRADY LEE JACKSON: We were teams.

[12:16] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Partners, right. So do I remember correctly that you weren't even supposed to be flying that night?

[12:23] GRADY LEE JACKSON: That night we were not. The Saratoga had at. We were in a kind of a stand down. And when you're in a stand down, that's when you do some maintenance required on airplanes that you normally do not do. And what we found out later is there was some maintenance being done on the airplane that we. That I ejected from. That was a box that sits in front of the pilot. It's called a pilot's horizontal display. It's a radar repeater scope that he can see the coastline and where you're going. But it was not a detailed radar, but it gave you an overall generation of the picture. And that set down low in front of the stick, but down, it was in there, and it was bolted in. So when the catapult fired that night, the box came back, which happened with a catapult shot. There is tremendous g forces back. As you go forward, accelerate, there's g forces that forcing you back into your seat. And anything that's not tied down is going to come flying back.

[13:34] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So the box was not properly.

[13:40] GRADY LEE JACKSON: They had. Maintenance had worked on the box, and they got called away to. The people that worked on it got called away to chow or whatever. And it was one of those things that happened in combat or anytime one time was doing things in a hurry. And we weren't supposed to be flying. We added on some flights, and being. I flew with Charlie was the senior. We agreed to take that add on flight.

[14:09] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: It was an add on flight. And what was the mission that night?

[14:12] GRADY LEE JACKSON: They found some trucks in North Vietnam, and so.

[14:15] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, and you were gonna go bomb them?

[14:17] GRADY LEE JACKSON: We were go bomb them, yeah.

[14:18] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. So it kind of came up last minute it came up and they assigned you to a plane that the crew had gone to dinner.

[14:26] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Right. And performed maintenance on it. And it was just one of those, we weren't supposed to be flying. All of a sudden you are now tasked to fly. Can you, can you launch some airplanes? And obviously the answer is always, yeah, yeah, we can get some airplanes.

[14:43] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And what aircraft carrier were you on?

[14:46] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It was on the USS Saratoga CV 60 bordone with our CAG, combat CAG. And then I flew with Commander Charlie Ernst, who was our CEO of our squadron, and I was his bombardier navigator.

[15:03] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so he was the pilot, and he was in charge of getting the plane off the ship and flying the plane. And your job was what, as a bombardier navigator?

[15:15] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It was nighttime, so I had a flashlight and I would have, there were some critical instruments that you could see if you're flying away. So I would hold that on my chest because the G forces would force you back and I'd have that light shining on this one critical instrument that basically showed that you were, in fact flying. It was a horizon instrument.

[15:39] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So, okay, what time of day was it? Was it after midnight?

[15:45] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Zero. 215 in the morning.

[15:47] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So 215 am. When, when you catapulted.

[15:52] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Right, so, so, and we were not supposed to be flying. And these were add on.

[15:57] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Yeah.

[15:58] GRADY LEE JACKSON: As what happened.

[15:59] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. And, and you mentioned this box. So, so the cat shoots you. And I know it all happened very quickly. Can you, can you describe, like the cat shoots you and then.

[16:13] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, as soon as the catapult fire, which there's a. It actually slings you off the carrier is what it does.

[16:24] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: It's almost like a rubber band.

[16:25] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It's like a rubber band, but it takes your whole airplane and pulls it down a catapult and throws you into the air along with the engine. But it's, it's a combination of the catapult and the engine throttle. So you're going off at full throttle and catapulted into the air. Will, what happens is you catapult that way, the G forces, anything that's not tied down is going to come back. So you always very carefully when you're pre flighted, you look up here on the glare shield and you could be a pencil up there. That was a dangerous instrument or a weapon at night. So you always checked up there. Is there anything in there? And you would pull on these boxes, but the problem is they were very heavy and they went down at an angle so you could pull on them and not really, unless you really did it at the right angle, you couldn't tell.

[17:23] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: You might think it was just.

[17:24] GRADY LEE JACKSON: You might think it was fastened down.

[17:25] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: When it hadn't, in fact, been tightened.

[17:28] GRADY LEE JACKSON: During the maintenance, performing maintenance, and it wasn't bolted down.

[17:33] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so the plane leaves the deck. And how quickly do you know that something's wrong?

[17:40] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, immediately, because as soon as the catapult fires, the G force has pulled. That box comes out.

[17:45] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: The box came out automatically.

[17:47] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I'm sitting in an a six. You're sitting side by side. So there's a small panel between the pilot and the momentary navigator, but there's nothing obstructing the view. In other words, I saw the pilot's horizontal display, this radar repeater. I saw it come out. So I knew when the catapult fired and I saw that box come out, I knew we were in extremist situation and he was trying to, with the stick of the airplane, knock the box back in. But it comes out at an angle, and so it would have been almost impossible to do that. And so it was that time where I saw that happening. And then immediately we went out and the airplane went, and you stall. We were loaded with fuel and bomb. So immediately after cuddle pole, then we started a roll to the right. And so about that time, I threw down my flashlight, grabbed the face curtain and ejected through the canopy.

[18:44] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Through the canopy. And the face curtain is like a ring above your head.

[18:50] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It's a ring, but it's also a. The ring is something you can grab hold of, but behind that is like a canvas, but very secure. That pulls the ejection seat. In other words, it's the thing that pulls it. So you actually pull that down and it protects you, and it puts you in that perfect ejection position. You don't want to be leaning over, you want to be back. And it makes you get into that crouched, more athletic position.

[19:26] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Interesting. I never remember. I never thought about that part. So almost like the. Like when you have a shift, like in a car, if you have an automatic shift.

[19:39] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Right?

[19:39] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And it was as though that's the shift. The position is between the pilot and the navigator. And the box came out and made it. But the box is right in front of me. He could not move the spot, but.

[19:49] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I could see it.

[19:50] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Yeah.

[19:51] GRADY LEE JACKSON: No, there's an instrument panel. I had an instrument panel in front of me, and there was an instrument panel. Radios and those kind of things in between us and which I had access to. And then in front of him was this horizontal, on this display, in this little box that sit in front of him. But I could see that just as he could see, he couldn't reach or operate my things, nor could I his. But I could see exactly what was going on. So we both knew immediately that we're in extremist situations.

[20:26] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And how many seconds went by between the time that you knew something was wrong and when you ejected?

[20:32] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, I watched it in, I think it was five and a half seconds or seven. I can't remember anymore. But you could. You go back, every takeoff and landing is recorded on the plat, the aircraft landing system. And so you could, and what you do at night, the pilot turns on the lights out on lights. And so that tells the shooter, the catapult officer, he's ready to go. He's at full power and he can launch him. And then he hits the button and then the airplane is launched off. Okay, so we turned our lights on. And if you watch and you go back, and then every takeoff and landing is recorded, there's a system. And so you can review like that. If there's an accident like that, you review what happened. And so you can see the lights come on and you see the lights go out and you see the lights go like that and crash.

[21:28] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So pretty quickly.

[21:29] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Yeah, it happened really quickly.

[21:32] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: How?

[21:33] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Because we were loaded with fuel, loaded with power. Yeah.

[21:35] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: You were heavy and then you were, and the stick was just jammed and not maneuverable.

[21:41] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Yeah. And so at that time, I could not, I could eject myself, but I could not eject the pilot. So then I fought the rest of my career and I eventually got in the EA six B's, and that was a four seat. And they had, I eventually got command ejection, the A six. And then we had it in the EA six B. They recognized there that.

[22:05] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right.

[22:06] GRADY LEE JACKSON: So that was built into the airplane and the design of the airplane, it was not initially into the a six.

[22:13] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right. When did you watch the tape? How many days after you crashed and Charlie died did you watch the tape of?

[22:26] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Probably the next day. Probably the next day.

[22:29] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Oh, wow. Yeah, that was probably tough.

[22:32] GRADY LEE JACKSON: You were probably still in shock, right? Yeah, yeah. No, I think you're really in shock for a couple days there.

[22:41] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. So do you rem, do you remember being shot through? I know your seat became a rocket when you pulled the face curtain. Do you remember going through the canopy?

[22:52] GRADY LEE JACKSON: No.

[22:54] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. Do you think you black out at that point?

[22:57] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I think that the g force is sort of, and you pull the face curtain, it comes down over your face so you're not seeing anything and it's nightdevelop.

[23:08] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Yeah, it was dark.

[23:08] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Dark. So.

[23:10] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so when do you remember? What do you remember next? After?

[23:13] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, I remember getting in the water and I have my oxygen baths also. I ripped that off and threw that away. And then at night, well, all time, all carrier out, there's a plane guard helicopter airborne. He stays off the side of the ship there. Right there in case like that. And they have a swimmer all ready to go. So they had a guy, they put a, they put a swimmer in the water. He came down and helped me. I was tangled in my chute. He got, he helped me get out of my parachute. And then, then you. The horse collar, and then you go up into the helicopter.

[23:50] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. So they lowered a horse collar, kind of.

[23:53] GRADY LEE JACKSON: They lowered a swimmer in the water via the horse collar. And then I got in the horse collar and he helped me get in the horse collar, and that was raised up. Then we, we were another 30 minutes or so looking, you know, trying to find out if, you know, if Charlie had ejected. I didn't think that he had, and I said I could not eject him at that time.

[24:15] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right, right. That must have been a really awful 30 minutes going around a dark ocean.

[24:21] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It all happened. Adrenaline is so high, and you don't think about it at the time.

[24:27] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right, right. So your parachute, after you ejected your parachute, anxiety, it's all automatic.

[24:34] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Everything happens automatic. Yeah.

[24:37] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Did you, do. I remember that you said you might have tried to cut away your, your parachute before the swimmer got to you?

[24:45] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, I tried. You have coke fittings, we called them. They were, they were metal fittings that held your parachute to your. You wore a thing that was, that you connected your parachute to when you got into the airplane.

[25:04] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: It's almost like harness.

[25:06] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It was a harness.

[25:07] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: It goes over your flight suit.

[25:09] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Yes, yes. And so, and then when you got in the airplane, you would hook your parachute from the seat you were sitting on. Your parachute. You would hook that to there and up here, the coke fitting. So you were wearing your parachute on the seat.

[25:28] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right, right. And didn't you say you were a little bit afraid that your parachute could fill with water and become an anchor that pulled you under before the.

[25:37] GRADY LEE JACKSON: That's why I got out of it as quick as I could.

[25:40] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right. You didn't want it to become.

[25:41] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Because that hadn't happened. People had drowned by their parachute filling with water.

[25:47] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Mm hmm. Wow.

[25:49] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And did you say you just do it right?

[25:52] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Yeah.

[25:53] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And we had practiced it in training, so.

[25:58] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: But still, at 215 in the morning with a carrier.

[26:05] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Your survival instincts kind of come out of it, of course.

[26:08] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right. Did you sustain any injuries?

[26:12] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I had. My left knee was cut as I went through the canopy because I ejected through the canopy, and the seat busts. The canopy. It's plexiglass, but it's very rigid plexiglass.

[26:24] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So you got a big gash?

[26:25] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I got a big gash in my knee, but other than that, no, I had no injuries.

[26:31] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: How many days were you recovering from your crash before you flew again? Like, when did you get back on the horse, so to speak?

[26:44] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I think I recovered pretty quickly. You know, they had to heal up. The wound had to heal up. It took some time. I think we had a port call. We went into port in the Philippines. It was that time. We came back out. Then I started flying again. Okay, so probably a month, but in that month was a port call of a couple weeks in the Philippines.

[27:06] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so you had a little.

[27:08] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I wasn't missing time that many flights, per se.

[27:14] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Well, and before we move on to another story, I'll say that I don't remember when mom found out about your crash, but as mom tells the story, living in. We lived in Virginia Beach, Virginia, at the time of your crash. It's where you. Where we were when you were deployed to Vietnam. And as mom tells it, it was a very common occurrence back then for a military car to pull up to somebody's little ranch house in Virginia beach to be given the bad news that they're like, Charlie Arendt's wife and family must have lived in Virginia beach, right?

[28:00] GRADY LEE JACKSON: She did. She did.

[28:01] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So she must have gotten that really bad news from some people in uniform at her door. But the man who came to tell mom that your plane had crashed, but that you were alive had gone to one of our neighbor's houses and found a woman, I guess. I don't know who it was.

[28:23] GRADY LEE JACKSON: I don't remember that.

[28:25] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And he said, will you please walk up to her door with me? And all I want you to do is have a big smile on your face. And I think that was because a lot of women would open their door at the time and see them in uniform and see the car, and they would freak out, and they would not be in a position to hear things, and they would just fall apart.

[28:47] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And actually, they didn't get a neighbor. It was Judy Piano that went with mom. Yeah, she came with the.

[28:55] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so you know who.

[28:56] GRADY LEE JACKSON: One of the wives that Linda knew, that mom knew.

[28:59] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay, so. Okay, well, that's. Okay. That's different than I thought, but, yeah, that does make sense. So mom found out, not through a.

[29:09] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Phone call, but already when she saw black navy car outside, but she saw Judy Piano, and she had a smile on her face. She said, I knew something happened, but I knew you were all right.

[29:19] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right? Yeah. So anyway. Well, is there anything else you want to say about that or about Charlie or.

[29:30] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, not really what I've said about Charlie, and that is that Vietnam, we lost some really incredible leaders. Charlie, he had worked for Bacon O'Meara. He was a brilliant naval officer. He had been in a. A four prior to time, so when he ejected, I think he had 500 missions or whatever. So he was. He was an incredible leader, military officer. And so we lost. We lost, you know, he was. He was destined to be a three or four star admiral. And so we lost Vietnam. We lost a lot of people that were. Would have been, you know, admirals and generals during the. Later on in life. So it was. He was a warrior. Charlie was a warrior. He was a great commanding officer. So.

[30:30] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay. Yeah. Well, we have about ten minutes left. I'm not sure we can tell your rescue story in ten minutes, but if you want to give it a try, I'm game. So the rescue story, Charlie was with you during the. I can't. I don't remember if it was you and Charlie or something.

[30:56] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Now, I'm thinking back on that. Or was this after.

[31:03] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: I know it was. I think it was before Charlie.

[31:06] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, it was 28th November, wasn't it? 1972.

[31:12] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Well, that was when your crash happened.

[31:14] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Oh, that's right.

[31:14] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: I know the. The rescue happened. We don't have to give any of the details, but as I said, jim Lloyd, that's the story I'm referring to.

[31:25] GRADY LEE JACKSON: The Jim Lloyd story was an a seven pilot from our air wing was shot down over Vietnam, and he was seen alive on the ground. And that was the key, is he had to be, to initiate search and rescue, a sar. Search and air rescue. You had to have positive id on the ground, the airplane. And we did, and we were. When he was shot down, we became the on scene commander in our a six. He was an a seven single pilot. It was shot down by a surface air missile inland over North Vietnam at night. It had gotten dark. It wasn't night when it shot down, but it soon became dark, so we became the initial on scene commander. And so we were directing the whole search and air rescue mission, which, you know, involved many airplanes. And you had a seven s. You'd have flak suppressors, and you'd have the rescue helicopter, which was they had large helicopters with guns and things like that on them for inland rescues. During Vietnam, normally you would not be a part of your air wing thing. So we. This all happened. We saw it happen and we were then, because you're the first ones there, you become the quote on scene commander. So we were control of Charlie and myself and because he's flying the airplane and we're down low at 500ft and below. So I'm doing all the talking on the radio and I, between me and the helicopter, so it's okay.

[33:03] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: So you're, you're, you're trying to get in touch with Charlie and also you're the.

[33:08] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Well, he could hear everything that I was saying outside the airplane. He was monitoring all that. So we did. We said very little inside the airplane. It was all my communication outside and it was. But he saw. We knew where Jim Lloyd was and we saw him alive on the ground, which he had to have that to even start a rescue. I mean, you had to have positive contact with the individual.

[33:32] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Talk about Jim and how he lost his. The guy on the ground was Jim and he lost his radio.

[33:37] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Jim was an a seven, a single seat, a seven pilot, fairly young guy. He ejected. And so the first thing you do, he established radio contact with his wingman, which was Bernie. Can't think of Bernie's last name. Great guy. But he. He had established radio contact, so he knew he was alive. He was on the ground, he was alive, he had his radio. So that was. That started the whole searching area. And basically the war stops everything.

[34:10] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: All the missions stopped, all the missions.

[34:12] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Stop, is now trying to get. It becomes a rescue mission, attempted rescue.

[34:16] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And weren't there some vietnamese people, either soldiers or civilians, near him?

[34:23] GRADY LEE JACKSON: There were. So he kept having to move to get away from them so we could even. Unless you have radio contact with the individual, you're not authorized to search an area.

[34:39] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And at one point when he moved, as I recall, he leaves his radio or it falls out of his pocket and he belly crawls or something. And he had lost his radio when.

[34:50] GRADY LEE JACKSON: He was in, but he crawled back and found his radio, which is a miracle in itself because no radio, no rescue. No rescue.

[34:59] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right. So talk about there was a point where you guys almost gave up, right? And you had to make the decision about whether or not he was in a place that you could rescue him. Isn't that how it unfolded after he did his.

[35:16] GRADY LEE JACKSON: We were the on scene commander, so it was up to us to make. Was it safe for the helicopter to come in and he had the rescue, Jim Lloyd, in a position that he could be rescued. That didn't necessarily jeopardize the helicopter and its crew.

[35:35] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: A lot of lives at stake in rescuing the one life.

[35:41] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And the helicopter was pretty vulnerable compared to an a six up air flying. So what we ended up doing was, and this is Charlie decision, he turned on our airplane lights that were on the wing, so it gave the helicopter something to vector on. He could see the lights up there. We were probably a thousand to 500ft somewhere in there. Over. And the thing about Vietnam, a lot of the places the rice padded, you were sea level, so it was, it was very level. It was not a lot of mountains. North part of Vietnam, there was a lot of mountains, but where we were, were rice paddies, so it was basically sea level. So we would, we turned on, we turned on our lights and so they could vector on us. And we're flying around and we, you know, we're an. Asics are pretty renewable and. And it would be very difficult for them. We were below their surface to air missiles and the AAA sites. When you're maneuverable, even with your lights on, it's not an easy target to hit. And it's just one of those. One of the things you do, you don't think about the cost of doing that, you just think about, hey, one of our squadron, our air wing squadron mates, is in dire situation and we need to get him out. And you have just minutes to do that. I mean, you don't get him out of.

[37:06] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And he was rescued by the helicopter.

[37:07] GRADY LEE JACKSON: He was rescued, picked up by the helicopter. In fact, the funny story was, is because of the. There's a lot of rice paddies in Vietnam. Well, the helicopter couldn't land in a rice paddy and you could get stuck. So the helicopter kind of hovered over the rice paddy and Jim. And they saw Jim out there and they waved him. The door gunner waved Jim to come into the helicopter and then he couldn't get up into the helicopter because. So the door gunner reached down and grabbed him by his flights and just threw him into the helicopter like a sack of. One of those things. You couldn't do that ten times. But in that. Yeah, that adrenaline, this is. This is. So soon as they got Jim in the helicopter, they turned off their light. They had their landing lights on, so, you know, so they were basically drawing fire away from Jim and everybody else to the helicopter. It's like, I remember flying around and Charlie and I were watching this and then the helicopter turns on us landing, like. And you're talking. Not just like a headlight, you're talking a thing. This huge bright light that lights up a huge area. And I said, holy cow. Not exactly that, but you know, one of those, I said, charlie, they turned on their landing. They turned on their lights. So, and, but they did get Jim into the helicopter. As soon as they did, they turned out the lights and.

[38:36] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right.

[38:36] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And they made it to South carrier And then we, then we got, we, when we landed, Jim came back aboard ship later on.

[38:45] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Wow. I bet there was.

[38:46] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And he didn't fly again. He, somebody had been inland like that. Had ejected inland. Yeah. People, civilian. Well, people in North Vietnamese were killed because of Jim Lloyd. So he did not have they. He was basically, his war was over. Retired.

[39:05] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Okay.

[39:06] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Because. Yeah, that was just a thing to.

[39:09] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: I bet he was super grateful to you all.

[39:13] GRADY LEE JACKSON: And I saw him years later at times and where he did that whole, the whole rescue in Pensacola years.

[39:22] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right. The story told. Wow. And I just have to say, I think that Jim, you said that Charlie turned your lights on to give the helicopter something to vector on. And I guess that's another, another sign of what a pro he was and.

[39:39] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Yeah, well, it's the thing that you don't think about it. You just, yeah, you know, we're here, we got. How do I help the helicopter get to where we are? And you have different lights and you. And some of the lights are up. In other words, it's hard to see from the ground. There are lights on the airplane out on the wings that you could. But you can see from the air.

[40:04] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Oh, okay.

[40:04] GRADY LEE JACKSON: So, yeah, it's not like you are saying, hey, here we, here we are. Here we are. But when you turn your lights on, when you back, you do that. You're saying, here we are.

[40:14] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Right, right.

[40:16] GRADY LEE JACKSON: It's not something I did. North Vietnam.

[40:21] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Well, and I'll just say in conclusion, because I think we're running out of time, that after Vietnam, you went on to have many commands. You were the director of electronic warfare at the Pentagon. You were the commander of Naval Base Diego Garcia, the commander of Naval Base Whidbey island. And the wing commander.

[40:45] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Oh, it's the wing commander.

[40:46] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: The wing commander on Whidbey Island, Washington. And then your swan song was the commander of Naval Base San Diego, where you retired in 1992 as a one star rear admiral, lower half.

[41:03] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Right.

[41:04] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: And I hope that people who are listening to this recording in years to come will be as proud of you and grateful for your service to our country. And if they are members of our family, that they will be as thankful that you survived your ejection in Vietnam as we have all been all these years, because I'm certainly glad that you.

[41:31] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Have been around me, too. Let me just say, too, on behalf of all the people who, a lot of people did not come back from Vietnam and the families who sacrificed husbands and fathers and brothers and all.

[41:49] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: You.

[41:49] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Know, nobody wants to go to war. When you go to war, you go to war to win. And unfortunately, any war, there's casualties of war. So. But it's, you do it. It's your, it's what you've been training for all those years. I've been training and yet able to do that. But the impact on the families is great. And that's a, I don't think you realize, you don't realize that at the time, but you realize it later in life how much my career impacted my family. And it's wonderful to have a wife and family supports and a daughter who supported their dad in his career. And 30 years in the Navy was a long time and many separations, as we all remember. And there's some great memories, too, of things that we did as a family, traveling across country and doing things together. That, and that was, I think, one of the things that I always tried to do because I was gone a lot is then when we were together, we try to do things where we get fun things, go camping, go do this and do that things as a.

[43:03] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: Family, which we did. So thank you, you for that, too.

[43:07] GRADY LEE JACKSON: Doesn't always make up for it, but it was fun for all of us.

[43:10] CHRISTINA JACKSON MACBRIDE: They were good memories. So thanks for coming, dad. Thanks for sharing your amazing stories.