2011 Chinook shootdown in Afghanistan

2011 U.S. Boeing CH-47 Chinook shootdown

A CH-47 Chinook helicopter in Bagram, Afghanistan, similar to the one that was shot down.
Attack summary
Date	6 August 2011
Type	Rocket-propelled grenade
Passengers	33
Crew	5[1][2]
Fatalities	38[3][4]
Survivors	0
Aircraft type	Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopter
Operator	U.S. military[5][1][2]
Tail number	89-00175[6]

On 6 August 2011, a U.S. Boeing CH-47 Chinook military helicopter was shot down while transporting a quick reaction force attempting to reinforce an engaged unit of Army Rangers in Wardak province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan.^[7][8] The resulting crash killed all 38 people on board—25 American special operations personnel, five Army National Guard crewmen, seven Afghan commandos, and one Afghan interpreter—as well as a U.S. military dog.^{[9][10][11][12]} It is considered the worst loss of life in the Afghanistan campaign, surpassing Operation Red Wing in 2005.

Contents 1 Deaths 2 Blow to U.S. special operations forces 3 Initial accounts 4 Later accounts 5 Subsequent events 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

Deaths

The deaths included:^[13]

• 22 U.S. Navy SOF personnel 20 of whom were from the Naval Special Warfare Development Group's (formerly known as SEAL Team Six) Gold Squadron^[14]
• 5 U.S. crew members from the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment and 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment^[1][2][15]
• 1 U.S. special operations Air Force Combat Controller from the 24th Special Tactics Squadron
• 2 U.S. special operations Air Force Pararescuemen from the 24th Special Tactics Squadron
• 7 Afghan National Army special operations soldiers
• 1 Afghan civilian interpreter
• 1 U.S. military working dog

The 30 American deaths represent the greatest loss of U.S. military lives in a single incident in the decade-long war in Afghanistan that began in 2001.^[16][17][3]

Blow to U.S. special operations forces

Fifteen of the Navy SEALs killed were members of the Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU), an elite unit of commandos formerly known as SEAL Team Six. This unit is best known for having carried out the operation that killed Osama Bin Laden; however, none of those killed had participated in the Bin Laden operation, which was conducted by members of DEVGRU's Red Squadron.^{[18][12][10][16]} The other two Navy SEALs killed in the helicopter shootdown were from a West Coast-based SEAL unit.

Their deaths are believed to be the greatest single loss ever suffered by the U.S. special operations community in the 24-year history of the U.S. Special Operations Command, wiping out an entire troop out of the three that make up SEAL Team Six's Gold Squadron (Premier Squadron).^[14][19]

A source from the Navy's special operations community described the reaction as, "Shock and disbelief. There's no precedent for this. It's the worst day in our history by a mile."^[20][14]

The previous highest U.S. death toll from a single incident in the war had also come from a rocket attack on a Chinook helicopter carrying Navy SEALs during Operation Red Wings. On 28 June 2005, sixteen Navy SEALs and Army special operations troops were killed in Kunar province when their Chinook transport helicopter was shot down by a Taliban rocket-propelled grenade, and three more SEALs were killed in fighting on the ground.^[10][12]

Initial accounts

The U.S. military helicopter carrying special operations forces to a night-raid in the Tangi Valley of Wardak Province, was most likely brought down by a rocket-propelled grenade, according to military officials.^[12][16]

General Abdul Qayum, the police chief of Wardak, said the military helicopter was shot down around 1 am Saturday after a U.S. night assault on a house in the village of Jaw-e-Mekh Zareen in the Tangi Valley that had lasted at least two hours.^[12] Local witnesses reported that at least two helicopters had taken part in the U.S. special forces attack on the compound, killing eight Afghan insurgents, but that just after the helicopter had taken off again it was fired upon from a separate position. Shahidullah Shahid, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said: "The US chopper that crashed last night was shot down by the Taliban as it was taking off. A rocket fired by the insurgents hit it and completely destroyed it."^[10][16]

A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabiullah Mujahid, confirmed that eight of the movement's fighters had been killed in the assault on the compound. He said: "They wanted to attack our Mujahideen who were in a house, but our Mujahideen resisted and destroyed a helicopter with a rocket-propelled grenade."^[10]

Later accounts

Subsequent reports stated that the U.S. military helicopter had been delivering reinforcements to U.S. Army Rangers, another special operations unit, when their night raid on a compound to kill or capture a senior Taliban leader went awry.^{[21][3][22][23]} During the battle US forces observed a small group of Taliban trying to flee the scene. The group probably contained the commander and a few of his bodyguards while the remaining Taliban fighters offered resistance in an effort to buy the group enough time to escape. In order to prevent this US forces called in for support.^[24]

Other reports alleged that the Taliban had laid an elaborate trap for U.S. special operations forces, luring them in with false information. A senior Afghan government official, speaking anonymously, said that Taliban commander Qari Tahir had fed U.S. forces false information about a meeting of insurgent leaders and fighters waited for the helicopter from both sides of a steep valley: "The Taliban knew which route the helicopter would take. That's the only route, so they took position on either side of the valley on mountains and as the helicopter approached, they attacked it with rockets and other modern weapons. It was brought down by multiple shots."^[25]

Subsequent events

On 10 August 2011, the U.S. military claimed that the insurgent who fired the rocket-propelled grenade had been killed only two days afterward in a Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon airstrike, saying only that intelligence gained on the ground provided "a high degree of confidence" that the person was among those killed in the airstrike from two days earlier, but providing no other details.^[26]

During the same Pentagon news conference in which he announced that the F-16 airstrike had taken out "less than 10" of the insurgents involved, ISAF commander in Afghanistan John R. Allen said the military investigation into the helicopter downing would also review whether small arms fire or other causes might have contributed to the downing.^[26]

See also

• List of aviation accidents and incidents in the War in Afghanistan
• List of deadliest helicopter crashes
• 1994 Black Hawk shootdown incident

References

External links

• For many Afghans, US helicopter crash confirms Taliban momentum, Christian Science Monitor, 7 August 2011
• Copter Downed by Taliban Fire; Elite U.S. Unit Among Dead, New York Times, 7 August 2011
• Afghan chopper crash a major blow to US commandos AFP, 8 August 2011
• Impact on special forces of Navy Seals helicopter loss BBC News, 8 August 2011
• US says Taliban who shot at US helicopter dead BBC News, 10 August 2011
• Photos of the Fallen WJLA ABC News, 8 August 2011
• {DoD releases the names of the fallen}: The stories of those who lost their lives in Chinook crash CNN, 12 August 2011
• Portraits of Navy Seals killed in Helicopter Crash Yahoo News, 12 August 2011

← 2010 Aviation accidents and incidents in 2011 (2011) 2012 →     Jan 1 Kolavia Flight 348 Jan 9 Iran Air Flight 277 Jan 24 Domodedovo International Airport bombing Feb 10 Manx2 Flight 7100 Feb 14 Central American Airways Flight 731 Mar 5 Antonov An-148 in-flight break up Mar 21 Trans Air Congo Antonov An-12 Apr 1 Southwest Airlines Flight 812 Apr 4 United Nations Bombardier CRJ-100 Apr 19 Tawang Town Mil Mi-17 crash May 7 Merpati Nusantara Airlines Flight 8968 May 8 American Airlines Flight 1561 May 19 Sol Líneas Aéreas Flight 5428 Jun 20 RusAir Flight 9605 Jul 4 Missinippi Airways Cessna 208 Jul 6 Silk Way Airlines Ilyushin Il-76 Jul 8 Hewa Bora Airways Flight 952 Jul 11 Angara Airlines Flight 5007 Jul 13 Noar Linhas Aéreas Flight 4896 Jul 26 RMAF Lockheed C-130 Jul 28 Asiana Airlines Flight 991 Jul 30 Caribbean Airlines Flight 523 Aug 6 Chinook helicopter shoot-down Aug 8 IrAero Flight 103 Aug 9 Avis Amur Antonov An-12 Aug 20 First Air Flight 6560 Sep 2 FACh CASA C-212 Sep 6 Aerocon Flight 238 Sep 7 Lokomotiv Yaroslavl plane crash Sep 14 Angolan Air Force EMB 120 Sep 16 Reno Air Races crash Sep 25 Buddha Air Flight 103 Sep 29 Nusantara Buana CASA C-212 crash Oct 13 Airlines PNG Flight 1600 Oct 14 Moremi Air Cessna 208 Crash Oct 18 Iran Air Flight 742 Nov 1 LOT Polish Airlines Flight 16 Dec 10 Beechcraft 65-80 Queen Air crash Incidents resulting in at least 50 deaths shown in italics     Deadliest incident shown in bold smallcaps