Vietnam Infantryman Learns to Ski After Leg Destroyed in Viet Cong Attack

By Kris Osborn – Warrior Maven

There were terrifying and uncertain moments as Vietnam infantry soldier Bill Caywood hung on a thin boundary between life and death, trying to contain bleeding while coming in and out of consciousness on a MEDEVAC helicopter west of Chu Lai in 1969.

“We were walking patrol. Typically we would walk early in the morning. Infantry would walk in single file formation separated by some distance,” Bill said.

Bill had been walking point through terrain typically filled with North Vietnamese Army snipers, booby traps, mines and mortars – when the ground exploded beneath him, destroying his lower leg and sending shrapnel and shell fragments throughout much of his body.

Thrashed, stunned and fighting unspeakable pain, Bill tried to get to the helicopter while fellow soldiers struggled to stop his bleeding and keep him alive.

“At that point, I was conscious and tried to make my way to the helicopter. I did not know how much trouble I was in. I went into shock at that point and was in and out of consciousness,” he recalls.

Then, medics sedated Bill to prevent an embolism from taking his life.

Decades later, Bill inspires others as a war veteran who regularly flies down snowy, mountainous terrain, using a prosthetic lower leg attached to a ski. For more than 10 years, he has participated in the National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic, organized by Disabled American Veterans (DAV) and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).