Newly commissioned officers toss their hats during the US Coast Guard Academy's 144th Commencement in New London, Connecticut, on May 21, 2025. (Photo by Joseph Prezioso/AFP Photo)

Netherlands' Joosje Burg, left, reacts after Argentina's Agustina Gorzelany's stick catches her on the face during the women's semifinal field hockey match between Argentina and Netherlands at the Yves-du-Manoir Stadium during the 2024 Summer Olympics, Wednesday, August 7, 2024, in Colombes, France. (Photo by Aijaz Rahi/AP Photo)

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 woman runs across the street next to an anti-tank constructions in central Kyiv, Ukraine on March 10, 2022. (Photo by Gleb Garanich/Reuters)

A cosplayer visits an anime fair in Beijing, Thursday, July 21, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

A detailed view of the BMW 1600 during the The 40th Antwerp Classic Salon run by SIHA Salons Automobiles and held at Antwerp EXPO Halls on March 3, 2017 in Antwerpen, Belgium. (Photo by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images)

The space shuttle Atlantis lifts off from launch pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida May 14, 2010. (Photo by Pierre Ducharme/Reuters)

A one-horned rhinoceros crosses a road inside Kaziranga national park on the eve of the World Rhino Day in Gauhati, India, Tuesday, September 21, 2021. Kaziranga is home to nearly 2,500 one-horned rhinos and is the world’s largest habitat for the rare animal. (Photo by Anupam Nath/AP Photo)