________________________________________________________________________Richard S. Kem
Army Engineer bridges over the Ban Thach River in South Vietnam. In the foreground
was an M4T6 bridge and the background an 840-foot, 13-pier bridge.
The terrain that we lived on, though, the Air Force base and the Phu Hiep Army installation
and airfield, were south of the Song Ba River. Where the river opened to the sea was wide.
Route QL1 passed over the river on a huge rail bridge that was decked. There was one-way
vehicle traffic over this very long, very big rail bridge. So, we really had a constraint and
bottleneck when we went north into the town. Tuy Hoa was just north of this river. We were
building the other bridge, the Ban Thach, at another outlet to the south. Thus, anytime we
went north we had to plan on the one-way traffic at the Song Ba bridge.
As I mentioned, our first priority was to upgrade the road from QL1 from Vung Ro north to
Tuy Hoa. Once we finished that, we were then to move north of the town and work on
upgrading that road on the way to Qui Nhon. That road was in much better shape. The road
from Vung Ro Bay was the main supply route to Phu Hiep Army installation and Tuy Hoa
Air Force Base.
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