In that the airlift was executed in phases, the Marines’ movement to Da Nang was accomplished in much the same manner as had been the task unit’s initial move into Soc Trang. On 4 September Colonel Ireland dispatched the task unit’s assistant communications officer and an advance party to Da Nang to assess the communications requirements there and to prepare for the arrival of the remainder of the Marines and their equipment. Four days later Marine wiremen, message center personnel, and radio operators began preparing a communications center at their new home. The next day the advance party established radio contact with SHUFLY headquarters in order to help coordinate the move. By 9 September MABS-16 technicians had assembled a TAFDS at the Da Nang airfield. This facility would enable the GV-1 transports participating in the airlift to refuel for the 460-mile return flight to Soc Trang after unloading their cargoes at Da Nang. While the advance party readied the facilities at Da Nang for its unit’s arrival, combat support operations and preparations for the move northward continued simultaneously at Soc Trang. During an operation on 5 September, three of HMM-163’s helicopters were hit by several rounds of enemy small arms fire. Although all three aircraft returned safely to base, the Marines suffered their first casualty to Viet Cong fire when Corporal Billy S. Watson, a crew chief, was slightly wounded. Troop lifts from Soc Trang continued until 1740 on 13 September when helicopter support operations were ended and the final preparations for the move to Da Nang began. On the evening of 14 September, the first of the Marine GV-1s slated to transport the task unit arrived at Soc Trang from Okinawa. At dawn the next morning, the refueler-transports began shuttling Marines and their equipment to Da Nang and the Army’s 93d Helicopter Company to Soc Trang. By the end of the day much of the airlift had been completed. The crews and helicopters of Lieutenant Colonel Rathbun’s squadron, however, did not begin displacing northward until the 16th when 12 HUSs made the seven-hour flight to Da Nang with three en route refueling stops. The 12 remaining helicopters arrived at SHUFLY’s new base of operations the next day. The move was completed on 20 September when the last cargo carrying GV-1 landed at Da Nang. _Accomplishments_