A group of Red Cross registered nurses and volunteers arrive at Yokota Air Base April 7, 1975 after assisting on a flight dropping off 325 Vietnamese orphans in San Francisco, California. The nurses and volunteers are all of wives of Air Force men stationed in Japan. (Timothy A. Wehr/Stars and Stripes)
This article first appeared in the Stars and Stripes Pacific edition, Apr. 9, 1975. It is republished unedited in its original form.
TOKYO — Nine Red Cross registered nurses and volunteers, all of them wives of Air Force men stationed in Japan, returned here Monday from a “babylift” flight carrying Vietnamese orphans to the United States and said they’d “make the trip again anytime.”
The group, led by Mrs. Ann Coley, a registered nurse, left Yokota AB early Sunday aboard a Pan American 707 carrying 325 orphans ranging from infants to age 13. President and Mrs. Gerald Ford met the plane in San Francisco.
“We didn’t get to see Mrs. Ford, but we did meet the President,” Mrs. Coley said. “He thanked us, said he was grateful for our help and ‘God bless you.’ “
Three hundred twenty-seven children had been aboard the plane — chartered by the Friends of All Children in Boulder, Colo. — when it left Saigon. Two youngsters were taken from the plane at Yokota and hospitalized at Tachikawa AB, one suffering from malnutrition and the other from conjunctivities, inflammation of the mucous membranes of the eyes.
Mrs. Coley said there were no complications on the flight to San Francisco, but “everyone was very busy.
“We had some victims of the C5 crash aboard and 270 of the children were younger than two years old,” she said. “Even an Air Force photographer who was aboard was carrying babies and boiling nipples and bottles,” she said.
“The children slept and ate in shifts,” said Mrs. Fran Lydon, also a registered nurse. “Some would sleep and we’d feed the others. We’d put the first ones to sleep and the others would wake up to be fed.
Ann Coley, a registered nurse, arrives back at Yokota Air Base April 7, 1975 after assisting on a Operation Babylift flight carrying 325 Vietnamese orphans to San Francisco, Calif. (Timothy A. Wehr/Stars and Stripes)
Marlys Moore arrives back at Yokota Air Base April 7, 1975 after assisting on a flight evacuating 325 Vietnamese orphans. (Timothy A. Wehr/Stars and Stripes)
Denise Racz arrives back at Yokota Air Base April 7, 1975 after assisting on a flight dropping off 325 Vietnamese orphans in San Francisco, Calif. (Timothy A. Wehr/Stars and Stripes)
One of the eight Red Cross registered nurses and volunteers (unidentified by photographer) arrives at Yokota Air Base April 7, 1975. (Timothy A. Wehr/Stars and Stripes)
“It was a continuous cycle.”
Infants were fed from bottles during the flight and Mrs. Coley said many of them developed diarrhea. Wire service reports from California earlier said doctors there attributed the intestinal disorders to the milk the children received on the flight.
“They apparently weren’t used to that kind of milk,” they said.
Mrs. Coley said arrangements to meet the children in San Francisco were excellent.
“There was a Red Cross worker to meet each child and they had brought along as many doctors as were available,” she said. There were 10 doctors on the flight from Yokota to California, she added.
One member of the group of nurses and volunteers who returned here Monday said she felt she could “do anything now.”
“On the flight home, there was a baby crying in the front of the airplane,” she said. “Many times, I wanted to get up and go pick it up.
“After the flight to California, I know I could have gotten it to stop crying.”
Other members of the group were Red Cross volunteers Betty Oryall, Denise Racz and Mary Ann Cantu and registered nurses Yvonne Duncan, Marlys Moore, Diane Decker, Gwen Graham, Barbara Johnson and Kathy Smyers.
Mrs. Graham and Mrs Smyers and will return to Japan later.
