Friday, May 5, 1972
TV Newsmen In Hue Have A Getaway Plane
NEW YORK (UPI) --The three major American television networks have chartered a plane as an escape vehicle for their newsmen in Hue, South Vietnam, as Communist tanks and troops move closer, NBC News said Wednesday.Robert Toombs, manager of NBC New Saigon Bureau, said in a cable to the network's New York office that the plane would be based in Da Nang.Twice a day, at noon and sunset, Toombs reported, the aircraft will be flown to Phu Bai, an airfield seven miles from Hue where it will wait 15 minutes with engines running for possible evacuation.The plane cannot be kept at Phu Bai, Toombs said, because of possible attempts by refugees streaming past it to take it over.All three network crews can elect to leave on the plane at any time, NBC said. The plane is on standby in Da Nang 24 hours a day and can move up to Phu Bai, about 50 miles north of Da Nang, whenever a crew calls for it.In the cable, Toombs said "Dangers to newsmen are not only possible entrapment by the enemy but also refugees and deserters who are desperate to get to Da Nang.""TV Newsmen in Hue Have a Getaway Plane" by (UPI), published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes on Friday, May 5, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.