Combat Wounded Veteran Meets Pilot Who Saved Him

Vietnam vet reunites with helicopter pilot who helped save his life
Daily Progress
David A. Maurer
August 8, 2015

“The sky was blue, clouds, just beautiful,” DeFazio said as he thought back to March 30, 1968, and the Vietnam War. “My thought was that I was never going to live to see the sunset.”

The rising sun was getting a foothold on the horizon when Michael F. DeFazio found himself lying in the dirt of a dry rice paddy with a bullet hole in his chest, and an exit wound in his back.

More than a year of intensive training to become a U.S. Army Special Forces medic informed the young Green Beret that his prognosis wasn’t good. If not for the courageous actions of a helicopter medevac crew, his name might well be etched into the reflective, black granite wall in Washington.

Through the efforts of Charlottesville resident Bill Fields, DeFazio and helicopter pilot Robert W. Barrett, who flew the medevac mission that saved DeFazio’s life, recently were reunited at the Vietnam Ex-perience Museum in Ruckersville.
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