“I Live On Chaos”: An Air Traffic Controller And Pathfinder In Vietnam

The son and grandson of U.S. Army veterans, Joseph Bellino was a high school wrestler from McHenry, Illinois, who joined the U.S. Army at the beginning of the Vietnam War. He was trained as a combat air traffic controller in Mississippi, and he served in South Vietnam as an elite Pathfinder. In this interview, he describes his training (often on-the-job) and his experiences leading a team establishing landing zones for air assault operations. Following his service in Vietnam, he became an air traffic controller at Chicago O’Hare Airport from 1969 until April Fool’s Day, 2008.