Paul Cecil (RH Pilot) wrote the book Herbicidal Warfare: The Ranch Hand Project in Vietnam. Chapter 9 is titled "The Year of Glory . . Death." The events take place 1966-1967 when I was there. A large contingent of pilots / Navs arrived in the fall of 1966 to build the Special Aerial Spray Flight (9 acft) into the 12th Air Commando Sq (21 acft) . During my year we took 2700 hits and lost 15 crew members KIA. I took 65 hits plus one NV Seagull. The Purple Hearts were so numerous that some crew members had three.

The most heavily battle damaged aircraft in USAF history (since 1947) is a Ranch Hand UC-123 nicknamed Patches displayed in the USAF Museum. We documented over a thousand hits; they have counted 600+ so far. (There are patches under patches). Patches is credited with seven Purple Hearts for crewmembers.