A resident jumps as he watches strong waves crash into shore as an effect of Typhoon Hagupit in Legazpi, Albay province, eastern Philippines on Sunday, December 7, 2014. Typhoon Hagupit knocked out power in entire coastal provinces, mowed down trees and sent more than 650,000 people into shelters before it weakened Sunday, sparing the central Philippines a repetition of unprecedented devastation by last year's storm. (Photo by Aaron Favila/AP Photo)

Mug shot of De Gracy (sic) and Edward Dalton. Details unknown. Central Police Station, Sydney, around 1920. (Photo by NSW Police Forensic Photography Archive, Justice & Police Museum, Histiric Houses Trust of NSW)

In the spring of 1965, within weeks of 3,500 American Marines arriving in Vietnam, a 39-year-old Briton named Larry Burrows began work on a feature for LIFE magazine, chronicling the day-to-day experience of U.S. troops on the ground – and in the air – in the midst of the rapidly widening war. The photographs in this gallery focus on a calamitous March 31, 1965, helicopter mission; Burrows’ “report from Da Nang”, featuring his pictures and his personal account of the harrowing operation, was published two weeks later as a now-famous cover story in the April 16, 1965, issue of LIFE.

Photo: Man your battle stations: The crew chief of helicopter Yankee Papa 13, lance corporal James C. Farley, mans an M-60 machine gun during a mission near Da Nang, Vietnam on March 31, 1965. (Photo by Larry Burrows/Time & Life Pictures)

Revellers enjoy the atmosphere during the opening day or “Chupinazo” of the San Fermin Running of the Bulls fiesta on July 6, 2015 in Pamplona, Spain. The annual Fiesta de San Fermin, made famous by the 1926 novel of US writer Ernest Hemmingway entitled “The Sun Also Rises”, involves the daily running of the bulls through the historic heart of Pamplona to the bull ring. (Photo by Pablo Blazquez Dominguez/Getty Images)

A tourist catches snowflakes on her tongue during snow fall in Times Square, Midtown, New York, on January 3, 2013. A major snowstorm producing blizzard-like conditions hammered the northeastern United States on Friday, causing more than 1,000 U.S. flight delays and cancellations, paralyzing road travel, and closing schools and government offices. (Photo by Darren Ornitz/Reuters)

“Old Mursi woman”. Old woman by the huts of her village. Location: Marenke, Omo valley, Ethiopia. (Photo and caption by Jorge Fernandez/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

ATTENTION! All pictures are presented in high resolution. To see Hi-Res images – just TWICE click on any picture. In other words, click small picture – opens the BIG picture. Click BIG picture – opens VERY BIG picture.

A Vietnamese woman, wearing the traditional “ao dai” long dress, poses for photos along peach blossom flowers ahead of the Vietnamese “Tet” (Lunar New Year festival), in a field in Hanoi, Vietnam, February 2, 2016. (Photo by Reuters/Kham)

People attend a Halloween event at Ocean Park on October 30, 2015 in Hong Kong. Halloween – a named taken from 'All Hallows' Even' falls on the day before All Saints' Day on November 1 – a holiday when Christians remember their deceased loved ones. (Photo by Anthony Kwan/Getty Images)