Zhao Qiang walks across a street in Shenyang, Liaoning province, April 14, 2014. Zhao, a community officer of the China Disabled Persons' Federation, was diagnosed with multiple when he was two, with the resulting tumour affecting the growth of his left leg, his grandmother told local media, citing a doctor's diagnosis. His uncle modified his shoes, fitting them with stools, to allow Zhao to stand and walk. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

“The Independence day”. While on storm chasing expeditions in the Tornado Alley in USA I have encountered many photogenic supercell storms. This photograph was taken while we were approaching the storm near Julesburg, Colorado on My 28th, 2013. The storm was tornado warned for more than one hour, but stayed an LP storm through all its cycles and never produced a tornado, just occasional brief funnels, large hail and some rain. Photo location: Julesburg, Colorado, USA. (Photo and caption by Marko Korošec/National Geographic Photo Contest)

Participants climb over a wall at the “Tough Mudder” endurance event series in Arnsberg September 6, 2014. Competitors who took part in the endurance event saw themselves having to overcome various military style obstacles. (Photo by Ina Fassbender/Reuters)

Ryan Randall plays the bagpipes outside a polling station in Edinburgh, Scotland September 18, 2014. Polling in the referendum on Scottish independence began on Thursday morning, as Scotland votes whether or not to end the 307-year-old union with the rest of the United Kingdom. (Photo by Paul Hackett/Reuters)

Laura Giombini of Italy reacts during the Women's Beach Volleyball preliminary round Pool D match against Jamie Lynn Broder and Kristina Valjas of Canada on Day 2 of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games at the Beach Volleyball Arena on August 7, 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Photo by Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)

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)

Two three-month-old female white Bengal tiger cubs play with a zoo keeper in their enclosure at the Buenos Aires' Zoo, in Argentina, on April 17, 2014. Captive white Bengal tiger Cloe, gave birth to three cubs – two females and one male – on January 14, 2014. (Photo by Juan Mabromata/AFP Photo)

Vultures gather to eat waste in Bica beach, on the banks of the Guanabara Bay, with the Sugar Loaf mountain in background, 500 days ahead the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro March 24, 2015. As part of its Olympic bid, Rio promised to clean up 80 percent of the bay for the games. But local government officials have already admitted that a cleanup by 2016 is not achievable. Despite millions of dollars of investment over the years, the bay still stinks of sewage. Sailors who visited the city for test events complained of a floating sofa and a dead dog in the water. (Photo by Ricardo Moraes/Reuters)