The hero pilot of Vietnam: Unearthed footage of the fall of Saigon shows desperate father throwing his wife and children onto U.S. ship - then jumping out as he ditched helicopter

·        Daring escape story from the 1975 Fall of Saigon has been uncovered

·        Vietnamese pilot loaded family onto helicopter and tailed U.S. choppers

·        But his Chinook was too big to land on the USS Kirk

·        Instead he threw wife and three children to servicemen below

·        All - including eight-month-old baby - landed safely, leaving him stranded

·        He then banked his own helicopter into the sea and jumped out

·        The chopper exploded, but he was able to swim away and make it to safety

·        Story has emerged in new documentary about the close of Vietnam War 

A heroic Vietnamese helicopter pilot saved his family - and cheated death - by hurling his wife children onto a fleeing U.S. warship during the Fall of Saigon, then leaping into the sea as the aircraft plunged into the waters behind him.

New footage has emerged showing his daring escape as the U.S.military withdrew from Vietnam in the face of advancing communist forces.

The pilot was one of several Vietnamese helicopter pilots who piled in during the United States' evacuation of all its personnel in Vietnam in April 1970.

Watch as 1975 Vietnam War crowd push CH-47 off US carrier

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Hovering: The pilot, seen above in the leftmost window, tailed U.S. choppers to make it to the USS Kirk, where he threw his family to safety because his Chinook was too large to land on the deck

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Explosion: The helicopter blew up dramatically as the pilot banked it into the sea as he leaped out after jettisoning his family

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Catch! Servicemen below were able to grab his falling children - the youngest of whom, above, was just eight months old

Their story - and new photographs and footage of their dramatic escape - have been unearthed and turned into a forthcoming documentary for ABC. 

While U.S. servicemen flew Americans, and hundreds of Vietnamese, between the embassy in Saigon and ships waiting off the coast of Vietnam, some South Vietnamese took matters into their own hands.

Armed only with their scarcely-fueled small helicopters, many pilots tailed the U.S. helicopters back to the waiting USS Kirk, and were allowed to land on board with their families and cram onto the ship.

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Desperate mission: After saving his family the pilot made his own escape, bringing his helicopter just above the water

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Escape! The pilot, seen right in the water, was able to swim to safety while the helicopter sank to the bottom

Joining in with the huge evacuation - dubbed Operation Frequent Wind - was their only hope of escaping torture and death at the hands of North Vietnam.

In now-iconic images, the useless choppers were then pushed overboard to make room for more evacuees.

But the new footage, compiled by director Rory Kennedy, also features one even more dramatic story.

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Target: Vietnamese choppers followed the Americans to boats waiting offshore - seen above as a white trail in the sea - which allowed them to land on deck

Refugees: Ships such as the USS Kirk were heaving with Vietnamese escaping the encroaching communist armies

One Vietnamese pilot followed like his comrades - but he was flying a much larger Chinook aircraft which couldn't land on the Kirk.

So instead he hovered an estimated 18ft above the deck, and hurled his children - aged two, five and eight months - out of the plane into the arms of U.S. servicemen, followed by his wife.

Then - trapped in his helicopter and fast running out of fuel - he pulled of his pilot suit, hovered as close to the water as he could, and prepared to leap out.

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Abandoned: Soldiers dumped landed helicopters in the water to make room for more people on board

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Evacuation: Thousands of people were carried out of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, above, by helicopters. It remains the largest ever helicopter evacuation

The pilot tilted the right-hand side of the helicopter into the sea, while leaping out of the left hand side.

The chopper exploded when it hit the sea, but after less than a minute the pilot's head emerged from the water not far from the sinking wreckage and he was taken on board the USS Kirk.

Operation Frequent Wind - which began using fixed-wing aircraft until all the U.S. runways were shelled and unusable - evacuated more than 50,000 from South Vietnam.

The helicopter portion remains largest evacuation by helicopter in history. Most Vietnamese who escaped during the Fall of Saigon were allowed to move to the United States.

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Desperate: Pictured above are dozens of Vietnamese piling on to a small helicopter on a building not far from the U.S. Embassy as part of Operation Frequent Wind