A Nepalese Gurung community woman, wearing traditional attire, prepares to participate in a parade to mark their New Year known as “Tamu Loshar” in Kathmandu, Nepal, Friday, December 30, 2016. The indigenous Gurungs, also known as Tamu, are celebrating the advent of the year of the bird. (Photo by Niranjan Shrestha/AP Photo)

Nikolai Vasilyev, 62, dressed as Father Frost, Russian equivalent of Santa Claus, water-skis along the Yenisei River outside Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia, December 10, 2015. Vasilyev, a teacher of the Krasnoyarsk Aerospace Academy, constructed the self-made water skis to travel on the water surface. The skis are made of plastic foam and the sticks are designed to propel him forward. (Photo by Ilya Naymushin/Reuters)

John Klatt and the Air National Guard MXS (right) and Mike Wiskus and the Lucas Oil Pitts take to the skies at the Memphis Airshow, on Sat., September 26, 2016 in Millington, Tenn. (Photo by Brandon Dill/Invision for John Klatt Airshows, Inc./AP 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)

In this Tuesday, July 14, 2015, photo, Phoe Thaw, center, a member of the White New Blood lethwei fighters club, a Myanmar traditional martial-arts club which practices a rough form of kickboxing, stretches during a practice session in their gym on a street in Oakalarpa, north of Yangon, Myanmar. Three of the club's members competed this summer on a stage a world away from the street gym: a mixed-martial-arts “One Championship” event broadcast globally on cable television networks, where fighters could receive $1,000 for each fight, according to coach Myint Zaw who started the traditional fighters' club 15 years ago. (Photo by Gemunu Amarasinghe/AP Photo)

Lance Sergent Martin Mitchell (R) pins medals to Coldstream Guardsman Martin Hughes in the Tailor Shop in Wellington Barracks on April 20, 2011 in London, England. Soldiers involved in the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton are preparing their ceremonial duties ahead of the day. (Photo by Oli Scarff/Getty Images)

A woman stands next to a giant jandal on Tamarama Beach as giant sculptures are installed ahead of the “Sculpture by the Sea” exhibition in Sydney on October 19, 2016. Celebrating it's 20th anniversary, Sculpture by the Sea is the world's largest annual, free-to-the-public, outdoor sculpture exhibition. (Photo by William West/AFP Photo)

“You” star, American actress Victoria Pedretti locks lips with American actor Fred Hechinger in New York City on February 26, 2024. (Photo by The Image Direct)