A portrait of Eric Abidal of Lyon prior to the UEFA Champions League Group D match between Olympique Lyonnais and Manchester United at the Municipal de Garland Stadium on September 15, 2004 in Lyon, France.

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)

A Thai performer puts his head inside a crocodile's mouth during a media preview performance as part of preparation to reopen Samutprakarn Crocodile Farm and Zoo in Samut Prakan province, Thailand, 19 March 2024. (Photo by Rungroj Yongrit/EPA)

People search for shells on a beach in Sittwe, Rakhine State, Myanmar, 17 September 2020. International Coastal Cleanup Day is observed annually on the third Saturday of September and will occur on 19 September this year. (Photo by Nyunt Win/EPA/EFE/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Mary McHugh mourns her slain fiance Sgt. James Regan at “Section 60” of the Arlington National Cemetery May 27, 2007. Regan, a US Army Ranger, was killed by an IED explosion in Iraq. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

A U.S. Army soldier with the 10th Special Forces Group and his military working dog jump off the ramp of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment during water training over the Gulf of Mexico as part of exercise Emerald Warrior 2011 on March 1, 2011. (Photo by Tech. Sgt. Manuel J. Martinez/U.S. Air Force)

An Iraqi man comforts his 4-year-old son at a regroupment center for POWs of the 101st Airborne Division near An Najaf, Iraq, March 31, 2003. The man was seized in An Najaf with his son and the U.S. military did not want to separate them. (Photo by Jean-Marc Bouju/Associated Press)

The Wovel could possibly be the most advanced human snow removal machine ever created, next to simply getting someone else to do it. The revolutionary wheel design reduces the risks associated with heart attacks and back injuries because it uses adjustable leverage and your own body weight to push, lift, and throw snow up to 18" deep. The best feature about the Wovel is compared to a gas-powered snow blower, this one will always start.