Policewomen take a picture inside a tunnel under the Chao Phraya river at a Mass Rapid Transit subway station in Bangkok, Thailand, December 14, 2015. (Photo by Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters)

A pair of Easter bunnies socialise in the sunshine on April 4, 2021 in Brighton, United Kingdom. Earlier this week, the UK government eased rules on socialising, permitting groups of six people (or more if limited to two households) to meet outdoors. The latest lockdown measures were imposed at the end of last year to curb a surge in Covid-19 cases. (Photo by David McHugh/Brighton Pictures)

A Palestinian waves fireworks on the last day of the holy month of Ramadan in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on May 1, 2022. (Photo by Yousef Masoud/SOPA Images/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Israelis take cover as a siren sounds a warning of incoming rockets fired from the Gaza Strip, in Ashkelon, southern Israel, Sunday, May 16, 2021. (Photo by Heidi Levine/AP Photo)

People take pictures of their reflections in the decorations of a Christmas tree, at a Christmas fair in Bucharest, Romania, Saturday, December 14, 2024. (Photo by Andreea Alexandru/AP Photo)

The first jaguar litter since 1975 was born at the Milwaukee County Zoo to Stella and Pat on November 13, 2013. The litter was on public display for the first time on March 13 when the jaguar baby's names were released. Belize schoolchildren named one Zean, which is the end of Belizean, and a public contest named the other B'alam, which means "great and powerful king" in Mayan. Photo: Stella the mother and her cub Zean rest together at The Milwaukee County Zoo. (Photo by Rick Wood)

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 meteor streaked across the sky above Russia's Ural Mountains on Friday morning, causing sharp explosions and injuring more than 500 people (20 had been hospitalized in serious condition), many of them hurt by broken glass. “There was panic. People had no idea what was happening. Everyone was going around to people's houses to check if they were OK”, said Sergey Hametov, a resident of Chelyabinsk, about 1500 kilometres (930 miles) east of Moscow, the biggest city in the affected region”. (Photo by Alexey Bulaew/RIA Nowosti)