Batting the Breeze

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Batting the Breeze

Steve Winduss

50 episodes

6 months ago

29/30 April 1975 - Vietnam War: The fall of Saigon - 50 years ago today How would you react if you had commandeered a Chinook helicopter and were flying over the South China Sea with little fuel, nowhere to land, your wife and children were on board and you're being hounded by North Vietnamese determined to bring you down? That's the situation that confronted Ba Van Nguyen in the last 24 hours of the fall of Saigon on 29 April 1975. Ba's son Miki was in that Chinook and talks with great pass...

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Personal Journals,

Society & Culture

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29/30 April 1975 - Vietnam War: The fall of Saigon - 50 years ago today How would you react if you had commandeered a Chinook helicopter and were flying over the South China Sea with little fuel, nowhere to land, your wife and children were on board and you're being hounded by North Vietnamese determined to bring you down? That's the situation that confronted Ba Van Nguyen in the last 24 hours of the fall of Saigon on 29 April 1975. Ba's son Miki was in that Chinook and talks with great pass...

Show more...

Personal Journals,

Society & Culture

Episodes (20/50)

Batting the Breeze

The Last Flight Out

29/30 April 1975 - Vietnam War: The fall of Saigon - 50 years ago today How would you react if you had commandeered a Chinook helicopter and were flying over the South China Sea with little fuel, nowhere to land, your wife and children were on board and you're being hounded by North Vietnamese determined to bring you down? That's the situation that confronted Ba Van Nguyen in the last 24 hours of the fall of Saigon on 29 April 1975. Ba's son Miki was in that Chinook and talks with great pass...

6 months ago

39 minutes

Batting the Breeze

What does an astronaut fear most? Believe it or not, it’s not dying. What tricks do you play on yourself to get to sleep the night before lift-off? What do you feel when you are standing in front of 180 feet of rocket which is about to propel you into space? Why would you eat at least one meal on the ceiling of the space shuttle each mission?Jim Wetherbee is one of NASA’s most distinguished servants. During his 20-year career at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Jim suc...

9 months ago

43 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Alex's Wish for Duchenne

Your son has a life expectancy in the 20’s. What are you going to do about it? Today’s guest is the embodiment of triumph over adversity, as are her family. Emma Hallam’s life is marked by extraordinary resilience in the face of overwhelming personal loss, culminating in the diagnosis of her son Alex with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Duchenne is a life-limiting, aggressive form of progressive muscle weakness. I’ll leave Emma to clarify exactly what that means for Alex and the family.But...

1 year ago

31 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Hurricane Michael and the Compassionate Captain

If I suggested that you spend nine months away from home and family and sail 32,000 miles around the world the hard way around (ie against prevailing winds and currents), what would you say? And suppose I then told you that eight of your crew had never sailed before and, by the way, Hurricane Michael would be waiting to greet you? Well, that’s what happened to adventurer, author and - to some - mad person Manley Hopkinson. As one of the skippers in the 2000-01 BT Global Challenge, the w...

1 year ago

31 minutes

Batting the Breeze

The Khmer Rouge, Mr Clever and Me

In 1993, Chris Moon MBE was taken prisoner while clearing landmines in Cambodia by Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, the most feared and brutal regime in the country's history. No Western prisoner had ever survived. Chris managed to keep his emotions in check and used his early-life farming experiences, army training and plenty of guile to attempt to take control of a situation that was stacked heavily against him and his team. After trekking through the stifling, malaria-infested Cambodian forest...

1 year ago

35 minutes

Batting the Breeze

The Good, the Bad and the TV Anchor

If you ever seriously considered a career as a TV Anchor, you had better listen to this episode first. Elizabeth Pearson Garr has been there. After growing up at Stanford and studying at Harvard, she ventured out to the wilds of Billings, Montana to become a TV anchor for KULR-8, an NBC affiliate. Within a few hours of her first day, the noon anchor went off sick and Elizabeth was reading the news - for the first time! Spoiler alert: it didn’t all go to plan. Listen in...

1 year ago

30 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Inhuman Trafficking

WARNING: Today’s episode contains adult themes, specifically sex trafficking and human trafficking, so please take that into account. Amanda Blackwood is a gem. She’s fun. She’s full of life. She’s also a survivor of human trafficking. Amanda engages in a raw and intimate conversation about her experiences of forced drug prescriptions as a child, subsequent sexual abuse by strangers and relatives, and repeated trafficking by men she thought she could trust. A...

1 year ago

34 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Twenty-two Black Arrows

In 1958, Sir Patrick Hine was part of a team of elite RAF pilots, the Black Arrows, who broke the world record for an aerobatic display manoeuvre that has never been equalled - and might never be. The Black Arrows performed a 22-plane loop twice in front of a euphoric Farnborough Air Show crowd. Sir Patrick later became Air Chief Marshal of the RAF and Joint Command of the British Forces in the 1990 Gulf War, but looks back at that 1958 feat with great pride and considers it one o...

1 year ago

35 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Battling the Breeze in the 2003 America's Cup

The America's Cup - the pinnacle of professional sailing and one of the oldest and most prestigious trophies in international sport. The 2003 America's Cup: 10 teams, 1 winner. What was it like to be a competitor in one of these elite teams? Simon Fry has experienced the thrills and spills, the highs, the lows, the fierce rivalries and the extreme physical demands of the sport first-hand. Originating in1851, when the schooner "America" triumphed in a race around the Isle of Wight, the A...

1 year ago

35 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Grounded by an Autobiographic Memory

Do you pride yourself on your infallible memory? Well think again. Memories about ourselves and the events of our lives are nurtured by our Autobiographic Memory and, shockingly, it turns out that it is unreliable by design. Our story centres on Brian Williams, America's one-time No. 1 news anchor. He reported from the front line in 2003 at the start of the Iraq War when the Americans were hunting down weapons of mass destruction. He braved Chinook helicopter missions within firin...

1 year ago

37 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Our Blue Planet Up Close and Personal

Documentaries such as Blue Planet and The Great Reef have brought new wonder and awareness into our living rooms. Former Royal Navy underwater bomb disposal expert turned submarine pilot Mark Taylor now explores the planet's oceans as an integral part of the subsea documentary filmmaking community. He has seen eels dip into lakes 750 metres under the ocean, witnessed mud volcanoes on the sea floor and come face to face with a giant squid 10 metres long with eyes the size of basketballs....

1 year ago

30 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Operation Clinker

In October 1988, the Hong Kong police executed Operation Clinker and achieved the largest ever drug haul in Hong Kong history. Bill Renwick was undercover with the team of four who heroically overcame two of the drug syndicate on a ketch somewhere on the edge of the South China Sea. Think of The French Connection meets Popeye with a sprinkling of Keystone Kops, and you have all the ingredients for this fabulous story.Check out show notes: https://www.battingthebreeze.com/operation-clink...

1 year ago

32 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Outback Odyssey

Can you imagine a silence so intense that brushing your teeth could be painful? Argentinian-born Nico Marino is a traveller. It’s in his roots. Having travelled on his bicycle across Europe, Asia and Africa, he decided to settle in Australia. To get to know his new homeland, he decided to go for a bike ride - from West to East - Perth to Sydney - right across the heart of the Australian Outback. An Outback Odyssey. He experienced a heightened awareness of the emotions we take for ...

1 year ago

29 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Vietnam War: Helicopters and History

It's 1968. The Vietnam War is at its fiercest. Robin Bartlett is a platoon leader with the U.S. 1st Air Cavalry Division. Robin’s platoon is deployed on regular helicopter combat assaults, sometimes twice a day. Getting into the Landing Zone is perilous - so is getting out. Robin recounts the day when his helicopter had ascended to 1500 feet, received gunfire and then moments later, the engine cut out. What followed was pure terror.For more information, check out...

1 year ago

28 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Beyond the Baseball Color Line

Rebecca Bratspies, New York environmental and human rights lawyer, shared with me the extraordinary and inspirational life story of Jackie Robinson, the first black player in US Major League Baseball, back on April 15 1947, after crossing the Baseball Color Line. Having written "Naming Gotham - The Villains, Rogues and Heroes Behind New York's Place Names", Rebecca was able to share stories of many other characters who have been commemorated on New York bridges, tunnels, parkways, boulevards ...

1 year ago

29 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Chronicles of a Serial Dropout

Forced to escape from a war-torn Sri Lanka with his family and move to London, Pradeep Kumar Sachitharan experienced a life of crime as a London teenager before his love for weightlifting gave him discipline and prospects. After a chance discovery of the benefits of qualifications, Pradeep embarked on an educational whirlwind through six universities leading to vice president of a biotech worth $1.6 billion. After a chance meeting in a Suzhou hotel in China, things got even better...

1 year ago

25 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Podcast Pyjamas

Today was a quickie just to let you know that Batting the Breeze is taking a short break. But don't worry; behind the scenes, everything is still going strong. I'm busy lining up amazing guests to share their experiences with you and putting the final touches on our long-awaited weekly newsletter. This breather gives me a chance to reflect on what's working, gather feedback, and make improvements. I'd love to hear from you, so drop me an email at steve@BattingtheBreeze.com with your thoughts ...

2 years ago

2 minutes

Batting the Breeze

During the Vietnam War, a group of courageous women embarked on an extraordinary mission to uplift the spirits of American troops stationed far away from their loved ones. The Donut Dollies. With unwavering bravery, they ventured into war zones armed only with warm smiles. Their story often goes unheard, but not for my guest today, Penni Evans, who left college at the end of December 1969 to find herself in Vietnam by the March of 1970. She was 22.For more information, check out show notes at...

2 years ago

21 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Parachute Roulette

At 22, Brad, an Aussie thrill-seeker, invited his family to watch his first skydiving experience. It was nearly his last. The thrill turned to panic as the first parachute failed to open. Then the unthinkable happened and panic became terror. The reserve parachute also failed to open. Brad and his instructor were plummeting to earth at terminal velocity. For more information, check out show notes at https://www.battingthebreeze.com/parachute-roulette We love receiving your fee...

2 years ago

22 minutes

Batting the Breeze

Jazz musician Rick DellaRatta witnessed the 9/11 attacks from a rooftop in New York City. While watching the unfolding tragedy in front of him, he was inspired to write a poem which later became known as "Jazz for Peace”. Rick didn’t realise it at the time, but Jazz for Peace would become a worldwide movement promoting peace, garnering international recognition and support, most notably from Barack Obama and the United Nations who acknowledged its impact. Rick shares memories of this ex...

2 years ago

22 minutes