Nick Turner brings special aircraft to Red Oak Airport

Nick Turner, an Elliott native and retired Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel paid a recent visit to Red Oak with a very special aircraft.   
In 2001, Turner was commissioned as an officer in the United States Marine Corps with an aviation contract, giving Turner an opportunity to become a pilot. Turner went to flight school in Pensacola, selected helicopters, and his first duty station was Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, flying the CH-53 Delta.
“My first squadron was HMH, which stands for Marine Heavy Helicopter 362, otherwise known as the Ugly Angels. The cool thing about that was it was the same squadron my dad was in when he was in Vietnam. So, I spent six years out there, deployed three times to Okinawa with the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, to Iraq and Afghanistan,” explained Turner.
After leaving Hawaii, Turner was selected to become part of the Presidential Helicopter Squadron, PHMX-1, from Quantico, Virginia. From 2009 to 2013, he flew then-President Barack Obama and then-Vice President Joe Biden. Following that, Turner went down to 8th Marines Regiment as a Joint Terminal Attack Controller.
“I deployed to Morone, Spain, as part of a special purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force that was responsible for high-risk, high-threat embassies in Northern Africa. And I ultimately deployed into Tripoli, Libya, to the American Embassy, which we evacuated two months after I got there because of the local tensions due to elections, back to Italy,” commented Turner.
Around 2015, Turner went back to a squadron, flying the CH-53 Echo, and did Department Head Tours as a Maintenance Officer and Executive Officer of that squadron before being deployed again to a special purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force as a Liaison Officer in Stuttgart, Germany. Turner finished up his remaining time in the Marine Corps in Camp Lejeune at the 2nd Marine Division as an Air Officer. Turner retired in the summer of 2021 as a Lieutenant Colonel and moved back to Iowa with my wife and kids residing south of State Center in a little town called Rhodes.
Earlier this year, Turner said he acquired a very special aircraft with a very special purpose.
“This aircraft served from 1965 to 1968. It actually just celebrated its 65th birthday on the 31st of May. It came across the assembly line of Sikorsky Aircraft in Bridgeport, Connecticut, May 31, 1961.The helicopter served with the Marine Corps in Vietnam. During that time it was shot down a couple times. It has 54 bullet holes. The tail had been blown off in a rocket attack, and when they sent it to Japan to be repaired, newer, more modern aircraft with turbine engines had started to become more prolific. And they sent it back to the States and used it as a training aircraft for a few years. Then again, the aircraft just became quasi-obsolete. So, they sent it down to Tucson, to the Boneyard, where they store aircraft. And it sat there until, I believe, like 1985,” advised Turner.
Turner said it was around that time that an Oklahoma businessman who used these helicopters for heavy lift work bought it for parts. Unfortunately, it sat again for about another 14 years before he started working on it.
“He started peeling off the paint, seeing all the bullet holes, and doing some research on the aircraft through the logbooks. He realized what he had was a true Vietnam surviving aircraft. So, being the true historian he was, he repainted the aircraft exactly the way it was in country, with the callsign Yankee Lima 37, and all the markings when it was an active-duty Marine platform,” stated Turner.
In 1999, Turner said there was a big reunion and met up with a bunch of the old pilots and crew chiefs who had actually flown on this aircraft. the aircraft also has a special connection to Turner’s father, Larry.
“My dad actually had flown this aircraft 11 times in Vietnam. The serial number 148783 is in his logbook,” Turner commented.
From 1999 until around 2012, Turner said the previous owner had flown the aircraft throughout Oklahoma, Kansas, portions of Missouri and portions of Texas from an education perspective to memorialize the 33 members that had passed away in the squadron between 1962 and 1969. The previous owner himself passed away in 2012, but he had some local friends and mechanics that had worked on the aircraft with him over the years and hey kept it going until around 2024, when one of them, unfortunately, passed away. Following that, the aircraft fell into minimal usage, and the businessman’s wife, who inherited the aircraft, she was ready for it to move on to its next custodian.
“That’s where me and my wife, Kimberly, come along. We’re now the custodians of this aircraft, and we took possession of it April 25th. Our goal is to pretty much to continue doing the same things they did: education, preservation, and to memorialize the 33 Marines that died in the Vietnam squadron. We’re going to fly it all over the Midwest trying to do that.”
Turner said he has known the owner’s widow for around two decades, and while he and many others thought that he may eventually be named as the helicopter’s custodian, he wasn’t sure it would happen until recently.
It was after doing an event at the Iowa Gold Star Museum that Turner was contacted about a special marine.
“I got an email from a gentleman whose father was an original Ugly Angel, who did the very first insert of Marines into Vietnam, April 15th, 1962, with Operation Shufly. Now, everybody thinks about the Vietnam, they think of the year 1965 predominantly, but the military were advisors very early on,” Turner explained. “This gentleman that reached out to me, his father was part of that original insert. Colonel Joseph Sales, 89 years old, kind of had a little bit of failing health, wheelchair bound, but still mobile and active. When he reached out to me, I was just like, ‘we’ve got to do whatever we can to get this helicopter in front of this guy, because, I mean, this is what we do, this is why we are doing this. It is the absolute definition of why we went through all this pain to get this aircraft.’”
Turner said they flew to Southwest Iowa and stayed at his mom’s and based on the forecast, took the helicopter down to Red Oak and filled it up with fuel.
“The people of the Red Oak Airport were gracious enough to put us up in their hangar on May 30, Then the next morning we flew it to Council Bluffs on Sunday, May 31, and met up with Colonel Sayles and his family, and wow, what a great event. It was fantastic,” stated Turner.
As part of his mission for the aircraft, Turner said he’s accepting donations for aircraft operations.
“She burns about 75 gallons an hour and it’s 100 octane fuel, and it’s about twice as much as what you would pay for your car fuel per gallon. With automobile gas around $4 per gallon, you can imagine what it costs. The helicopter holds 266 gallons, so it’s very expensive to fly this thing, and that’s just fuel, that’s not talking oil, grease, spare parts, insurance,” advised Turner. “I want to make it clear, we’re not doing this to make money, we’re doing this to preserve the history and get the word out. We have a 501c3, the Ugly Angel Memorial Foundation, and any donations are tax deductible. We are 100% donation, so every dollar that’s given to us goes towards fuel and parts and grease and oils.”
To learn more about the aircraft, make a donation, and see the calendar of events for 2026, visit facebook.com/yl37theflyingmemorial/, or the website, yl-37.org. Currently, they have 15 events planned throughout 2026, and they are already starting to take requests for events in 2027. They have have a Venmo QR code on the website, with their contact information as well. Turner said they would be happy to help people figure out how to fundraise or participate in an event.