By Scott Longman
At a certain point in this unfolding active shooter tragedy, it became overwhelmingly clear to USMC Lieutenant Colonel Charles Pitman that there was a simple, direct-action answer to the whole thing: just go steal a Marine CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter, load it with a bunch of Marines and coppers, and then go shoot the living bejesus out of the son of a bitch.
He had zero authority to do any of that, and in fact, it was liable to get him court-martialed. He did it anyway.
Let’s start with the LTC himself. He had an enthusiastic history of piloting helos right into where people who really don’t like you will try to kill you, to include three tours in Vietnam, racking up more than 1,200 combat missions. In the course of his storied career, he would earn a Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross (four of them), a Bronze Star with Combat V, along with a CONEX-full of other awards.
And as for getting shot down? Well, LTC Pitman had no problem at all with getting shot down. How do we know? Because he did it seven times.
The last time he got shot down, he also scored a Purple Heart, because some commie with a DShK 50-caliber machine gun blew a massive hole through his thigh.
So, not only did he not mind getting shot at, he did not particularly mind getting actually shot, and he most certainly didn’t have the slightest compunction about pulling deeply dangerous moves at the helm of military aircraft to go help others. Given that perspective on life, he was more than ready to bypass channels to go spool up one of his beloved CH-46s and solve the then-still-unfolding active shooter horror show that nobody else had yet been able to fix.
The disaster started with a goblin who won’t be named: some active shooters do it for the publicity, and there’s no need to be part of that. Nor will his supposed motivations be addressed, for the same reason. What he did, however, will be addressed.
The goblin started his unhinged rampage by pulling an ambush at a police station, killing a cadet. He then moved to a warehouse, killing a responding officer. His primary weapon was a Ruger .44 Magnum carbine, a gun with serious close-range destructive power.
For reasons known only to him, he picked the New Orleans Howard Johnson Hotel for his final stand, and he arrived there, tragically but appropriately, via a nasty carjacking. Once there, he started that attack by destroying the lives of a newly-wed couple and their families, even though he’d never seen any of them before. He then followed up by killing the hotel manager and assistant manager, and destroying their families’ lives, too.
Seeking to obliterate far more innocent people, he’d come equipped to set fire to the upper floors of the hotel, which he then did, in the successful hope of drawing first responders. He proceeded to snipe many of them from the roof.
Despite valiant efforts by New Orleans Police, they couldn’t find a game-over shot at him. Casualties mounted over hours, and all of this was televised, which is how the LTC became aware of it.
An extra piece of hardcore badassery that is missing from many accounts of this story is the weather. That might not seem like much at first, but weather very regularly kills aviators, and this weather was really bad. How bad? It was so opaque that the Coast Guard declined to fly in it, and coasties are world-class experts at flying in bad weather.
LTC Pitman did it anyway.
His plan was to lift off from his USMC training base and then fly essentially blind to the river, which he knew well. He used the river as a road into town. He flew by ships so low that the men at the rails were looking down on his helo. When he got to a notable bridge, he gained altitude and then followed the road downtown. To the surprise and probable delight of the police then present, he descended from the fog into a parking lot.
Several NOPD officers with long guns boarded, and the assembled team went after the shooter. After numerous passes at the HoJo’s rooftop, a clear shot emerged, and they took it. And by “they,” that means everybody aboard and their whole Christmas card list: the shooter’s body was eventually recovered with more than 200 gunshot wounds.
LTC Pitman’s actions gained immediate national attention, and he was rightly hailed for his courage and his initiative. You’d think that the Marine Corps would have immediately sent him on a nationwide recruitment tour and maybe put his magnificently hardass visage on posters. Instead, some mid-wits tried to court-martial him. Before that process got too far, the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee explained to them, maybe even politely, the error of their ways, and that case went away. Pitman then continued his highly distinguished career, finally retiring in 1990 as a Lieutenant General.
Part of the way he summarized his storied life was simply—and perhaps perfectly—this: “My goal was to be a Marine.”
