In article <9011A52E011ED311B4280004AC1BA615B11387@yalepress3.unipress.yale.edu>,
David Woyciesjes <DAW@yalepress3.unipress.yale.edu> wrote:
>Erik, Bruce, and fellow VAXen ---
>	I'm passing this on to the AlphaNT mailing list, because I know
>there are some VMS guys there, who might be able to help. If someone else
>has already helped Erik, even better...

There are also public domain programs that do this under unix.
try a google search for 'read vms tape from unix'

christos