Word: aboard
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...strength or the will to hold off the armies sweeping down from the communist North. The fall of Danang late in the month produced scenes of horror that appeared to foreshadow what might happen later in Saigon: panic-maddened South Vietnamese soldiers trampling women and children to get aboard the last American 727 to fly out; desperate soldiers clinging to the landing gear of that plane only to fall off into the South China Sea or be crushed against the undercarriage...
...looked on the road, they had left all their military clothing and supplies: canteens, caps, coats, pants, boots, belts--they must have ended up fleeing in their shorts!" Some, in fact, had done exactly that. Nam Pham, venturing into the streets of Saigon on April 29 before shoving aboard a barge at the river docks, noticed among the crowds a number of young men clad in nothing but boxer shorts...
...crowd shouting through bullhorns "things like, 'We're not going to leave you. Don't worry about it,'" as Summers recalls. "And we believed it at the time, which made it more bitter at the end." The officers formed the Vietnamese into groups of about 60 to be loaded aboard the helicopters that were landing on the roof and in the courtyard. During daylight, officers set off colored smoke bombs to help helicopter pilots locate the embassy. After dark, Herrington rigged up a different system. He found an old carousel slide projector, mounted it on the roof of one building...
...Vietnamese volunteer fire department waiting patiently in their yellow coats in the parking lot. Herrington had asked them earlier if they wanted to leave but they insisted on staying to the last in case they should be needed to put out a fire that might disrupt the evacuation. Aboard the U.S.S. Okinawa, Herrington was reunited with Summers, who told him, "You saw betrayal at its worst...
...Vietnamese left behind, however, were so stoical--or friendly. Kenneth Moorefield, a foreign-service officer and former infantry captain who put the dazed Ambassador Martin on one of the last choppers out, climbed aboard one himself shortly after. His last look around the embassy contrasts with Herrington's: "Hundreds of Vietnamese had swarmed over the walls and were looting the warehouse, the offices, the snack bar. Some were driving embassy cars around and around in almost a maniacal frenzy. On the other side of the walls, crowds were shouting chants against the U.S., celebrating the imminent victory of the communists...