By RAY WYCHE
Staff Writer

A retired U. S. Air Force colonel living at Lake Waccamaw has been selected for membership in the Distinguished Flying Cross Society in recognition of his actions under enemy fire in Vietnam in 1971 and 1972.

Virgil Batten, a native of Hallsboro, spent 30 years in the U. S. Air Force and received the medals “for heroism and extraordinary achievement” as pilot and aircraft commander of a C-130 “Spectre” gunship, destroying gun emplacements, military vehicles and river barges in 105 “under fire” missions over North Vietnam.

For his actions in Vietnam, Batten was also awarded the Legion of Merit and seven Air Medals.

His job was to attack supply lines, including shooting trucks and barges loaded with military equipment. The attacks took place at night as hails of anti-aircraft fire surrounded Batten’s four-engine 130. The aircraft, originally built as a transport, was armed with a 105-millimeter cannon and with 20 and 40-millimeter rapid-fire guns.

The guns were mounted on the left side of the fuselage of the airplane which was aimed at the target by a complex radar system. To fire on his targets, Batten flew in a circle, lining up his big plane like a fighter aircraft. Crews kept ammunition loaded in the guns and Batten pressed a button that fired the weapons.

Often he was called on to fly seven missions per week, with each mission requiring up to five hours in the air.

“I really didn’t get any kind of break,” he says of his continuous action during his year in battle. It was nerve-wracking flying, and some planes in Batten’s unit did not return from missions. The more time spent over the target the less chance the aircraft had of returning safely to base.

“You shot your target and you got out as soon as you could,” he says.

“I was pretty fortunate. I took only one hit,” he says.

Batten’s entire Air Force flying career was spent in the cockpits of transport aircraft. A graduate of Hallsboro High School, he earned a degree from N.C. State University where he was a member of the Air Force ROTC. He entered active duty upon graduation from college in 1960.

His flying skills led to his being selected as the first Air Force pilot to fly a C-130 into the middle of a Pacific typhoon, where his instrument-loaded aircraft flew inside the Pacific Ocean hurricane.

Batten’s 30-year career in the Air Force ended as a member of the Air Force inspector general’s team. He resided in Holden Beach after retiring in 1990 and later moved to a lake front home at Lake Waccamaw.

“It was a great career,” he says of his Air Force days. “I got to see a lot of the world and I had a lot of opportunity to manage things.”