The three 105mm howitzers on 881S were also used extensively in the direct fire role and were especially useful against targets of opportunity. The ever-present fog around the hill reduced the number of such targets but on one occasion a momentary break in the weather yielded an extremely lucrative prize. When the fog suddenly lifted, an alert Company I machine gunner spotted a 20-man column of North Vietnamese slowly climbing Hill 758 which was due south of 881S. They were carrying what appeared to be several mortar tubes. The Marine immediately opened fire and even though the range was 1,200 meters he managed to hit several of the enemy soldiers. Instead of scattering, the remaining NVA troopers clustered around their fallen comrades and this proved to be a fatal error. The C/1/13 gunners attached to Company I sprang to the 105mm howitzer on the south side of the hill, quickly knocked aside the parapet, and depressed the tube for a downhill shot. Using a combination of point detonating and VT fuzes which were set to explode 50 feet above the ground, the gunners slammed a dozen rounds of direct fire into the midst of the tightly packed enemy soldiers. By the time the fog closed in again, there was no sign of life on the opposite slope. The action was so brief, that the first report received at the 3/26 CP was a laconic message from Captain Dabney that 20 North Vietnamese had been sighted, engaged, and killed. There were also innovations inside the compound. Ever since 21 January, the NVA gunners had concentrated their fire on the base ammunition dumps. Originally there were two large caches but the main one was totally destroyed on the opening day of the battle. After that, Colonel Lownds decentralized his stores in several widely-scattered berms which were large, 12-foot-deep trenches, gouged out of the ground by bulldozers. One end of the berm was sloping so that 2-1/2 ton trucks could be driven down a corridor between two flanking stacks of ammunition which lined the sides of the trench. This arrangement greatly facilitated loading because the Marines could stand on top of the stacks and pass rounds onto the bed of the truck which was at their level. The driver then backed out of the berm and took the ammunition to the distribution points of the various units. The ammunition was not only dispersed, it was also segregated according to type. This way, if a berm of artillery high-explosive shells was hit, fire fighters were not hampered by tear gas or white phosphorous fumes. On three occasions, ammunition stores were hit but the resulting devastation never reached the proportion of that on the 21st.(170)