This photo was taken around February or March of 1982 at Katterbach AAF. It shows Cobra mechanics from D Company, 501st ABC, towing one of the brand new AH-1S Cobra's through the front gate of the airfield. This aircraft had made an emergency landing inside Bismarck Kaserne after the crew got a warning light. Our mechanics were sent across the road to retrieve it. As far as I know this aircraft was undamaged except for the mechanical malfunction that caused the emergency landing.
The little yellow tug towing the Cobra has its own story. By the late 1970's it was no longer being used, and was abandoned in our motor park. Sometime in late 1981 we towed it into our hanger and did an inspection. Scavengers had removed many items from it over the years, so we had to do some scavenging of our own. We flew a special mission to K-town (Kaiserslautern) where we acquired several needed parts from the surplus Army equipment facility. One of our mechanics showed initiative by borrowing a starter from a Dodge Pickup that belonged to one of our sister companies. Once we got the tug running, one of our Warrant officers painted it after work. You would have thought Delta Company just got a new car, because after the paint job our First Sergeant jumped aboard and had me drive him to Battalion HQ's on the other end of base. Our timing couldn't have been better, since the new Cobra's began arriving in early 1982. They weighed close to five tons, and were just about impossible to move by hand on our ramp.
