When Lemmings Fly: Helicopters in the Wilds of Alaska - Paperback

by Thomas L. Smith (Author)

We were friends, back from the war in Vietnam, putting our hard earned skills to use in Alaska where helicopters were new to the rugged mountains of the vast wilderness. One day I would take a miner to his gold claim, the next I'd be fighting a monster forest fires. We flew long hard days, and took our time off just as seriously, often partying through the night only to get up and float a wild river the following day.

Author Biography

There were five children in my family, along with a dog, a cat, two horses, twenty chickens, a boa constrictor, a parrot and a monkey. In my late teens a fairly normal childhood was interrupted when our parents died in a plane crash on the way to a party. A few years later, after a suspension from college, the army drafted me. Life seemed to be going from bad to worse so I tried to turn it around by learning to fly helicopters while I was in the service. That didn't seem like such a good idea after I got shot down and seriously injured in Vietnam. However, when I moved to Alaska things got better. I fell in love with the wilderness, flying among the tall mountains, and a girl named Kathy. Then PTSD entered my life. Over the course of twenty-five years the disorder did everything but kill me. But from chaos came life in the form of our two sons, and meaning in measure of the books I have written.