Tiny Copter a Good Scout : Aircraft: Its civilian owner rebuilt the OH-6 Vietnam War-era chopper. Now the rare whirlybird has a movie role.

Al Gerbino, 56, stocky and carrying a bit of a paunch, is an unlikely-looking warrior, but there he was in his green flight suit, hanging out the door of a low-flying helicopter, machine gun at the ready.

At the controls of the tiny OH-6 scout helicopter was Col. Hugh Mills Jr., a bona fide Vietnam combat pilot from the Army’s 1st Infantry Division.

The helicopter is a replica of the ship that Mills flew in Vietnam. Owned by Gerbino, who rebuilt it, it is one of the stars in a forthcoming television documentary film on Vietnam combat helicopters by director Monte Markham.

So there they were on location in Orange County, their copter buzzing low among the trees like a mad bumblebee and popping up over hedgerows, as they duplicated the kind of low-level flying the “aero-scouts” did in the war. Only this time it was for Markham’s cameras.

Gerbino, a transplanted New Yorker residing in Torrance, makes a living coordinating the procurement and operation of aircraft for movies. He worked on the military action spoof “Hot Shots,” starring Charlie Sheen and Valeria Golino and is now involved in the sequel. Between films, he works as caretaker at the old Marineland aquatic park in Rancho Palos Verdes.

His participation in the Vietnam documentary is the latest example of how he has maneuvered his OH-6 into the spotlight. He rebuilt the craft six years ago, hoping to create a memorial to the pilots and gunners who flew scout missions in Vietnam.

Since then he has used air shows--and now a movie--to showcase his OH-6, the only one of its kind in private ownership. He hopes one day to establish an air museum that will feature this and other Vietnam-era helicopters.

“I’m not trying to glorify war, only trying to preserve a bit of aviation history,” Gerbino said. “No one has taken the time to acknowledge these guys. . . . Nobody gave a damn about these scout ships . . . or Vietnam.”

Gerbino was a maintenance worker for Alexair Helicopters of Torrance--an air transport company--when he bought what he thought was a secondhand Hughes 500 in 1987, paying about $60,000, according to Eli Alexander, the owner of Alexair.

Friends there describe Gerbino, who flies helicopters and fixed-wing planes, as a mechanical and electronic whiz.

“He’s very handy, very knowledgeable in a lot of different areas,” Alexander said. “(He) can fix almost anything,”

At the time, Gerbino was just looking for personal transportation, not a war bird. The helicopter looked like a 1969 Hughes 500, but on closer inspection he discovered strange, reinforced metal pads between the ribbing on the floor. The pads turned out to be gun mounts.

With a little checking, he discovered that he didn’t have a civilian helicopter. It was an OH-6 scout, built exclusively for the Army. Both models were built by Hughes and look alike on the outside.

His OH-6 is the only one ever registered for civilian use. Hughes had shipped the military prototype to a Japanese manufacturer licensed to build hundreds of the military version for the Army. Some years later, it was sold to a Japanese company for executive use, then shipped back to the United States and resold, its military past apparently forgotten.

After more research, Gerbino decided to turn the bird back into an Army scout ship, complete with Vietnam markings and machine guns.

He was more than up to the job. Those who know him say he is a genius at tracking down all things aeronautical.

“He’s a very bright guy, knows a lot about aircraft, where they are, who has them,” said producer Bill Badalato, with whom Gerbino is working on the “Hot Shots” sequel.

Gerbino’s hope was to enter the helicopter in air shows, where Vietnam-era aircraft were scarcely represented. While rebuilding the aircraft, he telephoned Col. Mills, who was still on active duty, in St. Louis. The two talked, and Mills decided to come out and see the ship for himself.

“When he said he had an OH-6, I thought he was wrong. I knew no OH-6s had been sold (to civilians),” Mills said. “He has the only civilian-owned OH-6 in the world.”

With the much-decorated Mills as his technical adviser, Gerbino recreated the war scout, giving it the same markings that had been on Mills’ helicopter when he was the commanding officer of the 4th Cavalry’s “Darkhorse” aeroscout platoon in Vietnam.

“From a combat pilot’s point of view, they were great little ships, . . . very nimble, with a terrific engine that took all kinds of abuse,” Mills said.

OH-6 fliers searched out the enemy, flew ground cover fortrapped ground units and directed gunships to their targets. The helicopter looks like a plump green olive, with a toothpick for a tail and four rotor blades to keep it aloft.

Flying only a few feet above the terrain, hovering sometimes to draw enemy fire, the crews depended on speed and agility to stay alive. The helicopter’s airframe was built to protect the crew in a crash, letting them walk away from the wreckage if they got shot down.

That often happened. One scout pilot had four birds shot out from under him in one long day of fighting, Mills wrote in a book about his war experiences, “Low Level Hell.”

Gerbino had completed the restoration by 1988, in time for the Hawthorne Air Fair. However, when he tried to enter the ship in the war bird section, fair officials insisted that it had to go back to where the civilian helicopters were inconspicuously displayed. Space upfront was reserved for more glamorous machines.

Gerbino protested. This was a war bird with a colorful past. It belonged with the Sopwith Camels, Tiger Moths, P-51 Mustangs and B-17 Fortresses, aircraft from two World Wars.

“No one else ever took the time to acknowledge these guys or the remarkable ship they flew. It was like they were ignoring or hiding the Vietnam War, until I came along,” Gerbino said.

Gerbino got his way. The little helicopter drew big crowds in Hawthorne and, a year later, in a large international air show in Oshkosh, Wis., where it won top honors.

“The people lined up five or six deep,” Gerbino said. “Most were tourists, there to look at the guns and say ‘Gee,’ but we attracted veterans too, and you could tell them from the rest. They were the silent ones, just standing there, looking. One even cried.”

The OH-6 got into the movies quite by chance.

Actor-director Markham was scouting film locations for another project and thought the old Marineland site looked good. The gate was locked, so he climbed the fence and was confronted by Gerbino, the caretaker.

Gerbino, who uses the former Marineland site’s hangar-like warehouse to build sets and props, had been working as an aerial coordinator on movies for several years. Never, however, had his OH-6 made a movie appearance. When Markham told him he was planning a film on Vietnam helicopters, Gerbino showed him the OH-6.

The film promises to give the helicopter some recognition--and spark more interest in the story of Vietnam-era aviation. Said Gerbino: “That’s my goal.”