Another tactic sometimes employed by gunships, according to Glover, is a show of force, in which pilots and crew fire into an empty field or stand of trees just before a transport helicopter prepares to land, using the sound of a gun alone to keep enemy heads down and fingers off triggers. Today. But the CH-47D has neither a flight nor voice recorder, only an engine performance data recorder for maintenance. Extortion 17 was the call sign of a special operations mission in Afghanistan on Aug. 6, 2011, that responded to an Army Ranger unit engaged in a firefight with the Taliban and in need of backup. ", "Taliban laid trap for Chinook: official", "Honor Roll: Remembering the 30 U.S. At 01:00, they decided to engage the group with the SEAL reserves. Early media reports suggested that the Army had been tardy to recover flight recorders from the downed Chinook, and, as a consequence, the recorders had been swept away by the flood. And thats fine; thats what you signed up for, Lee said. He said, "And now, to our honor roll of American Service Personnel killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. The duo may also have had no ties to Tahir or any of his suspected fighters, and attacked the helicopter on their own. Why was the black box missing from the crash site? Should the Apaches, or the AC-130 overhead, have fired upon the groups of suspected Taliban that gathered in the village after the raid began? Though both noted that airborne sensor coverage and closer AH-64 gunship escort should be considered in future operations, nothing could have kept the shooters from firing their RPGs that night. One of the engines flew off, and the other caught fire. According to one Army report, in the three months prior to the Juy Zarin raid, as many as 17 RPGs were fired at helicopters over Wardak and Logar provinces, a relatively small part of the country. You never want to use the same landing zone twice, Darack said. He was assigned to the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), New Century, Kansas, Spc. A Department of Defense official asserted that there were no leaks from the Afghans. Cookie Policy [11], Separately, ISR aircraft continued to observe the unengaged group from the compound. Hs unit called itself Extortion Company. One of his Chinooks, flying under the call sign Extortion 17 (one-seven), was tasked with the special operations mission the night of Aug. 6. For example, on 8 June 2011 another Chinook helicopter was engaged from five to six locations (i.e., points of origin) with 14 rocket-propelled grenades, forcing the crew to abort their mission. Around 2:40 a.m., an Apache pilot flying in support came on the radio and shouted: Fallen Angel. The U.S. Navy SEAL task force assigned to conduct operations in Tangi Valley was well conditioned to the dangerous operating environment. A Black Hawk Down of the war in Afghanistan, the deadliest day for the U.S. in 12 years of that conflictand a military investigation that covered up evidence of an inside job by the Taliban. The Afghan soldiers were an essential part of the package; they were trained to move with our forces to the target. Mission commanders, believing that Tahir was likely among one of the groups, deployed an Immediate Reaction Force (IRF) to interdict them while the Rangers held the compound. In less than five seconds, the helicopter crashed, killing all occupants, and approximately 30 seconds later, one of the AH-64 Apache helicopters radioed in the crash. There are a lot of bullets out there that say To whom it may concern,says Major Doug Glover, a U.S. Marine F/A-18D weapons and sensors operator who was a senior watch officer for the Marine air operations center in southern Afghanistan. At 31 U.S. military personnel killed, the shoot down of Extortion 17 represents the greatest single-incident loss of U.S. lives in Operation Enduring Freedom - Afghanistan, surpassing the 16. The resulting explosion destroyed the aft rotor assembly. An official investigation found no evidence of a pre-planned ambush, though it did suggest that other helicopter activity in the area could have tipped off Taliban fighters that more helicopters could be approaching, according to the report. The crash sent shock waves throughout U.S. special operations. His account of the brave pilots, crew, and passengers of Extortion 17 and . Alexander J. Bennett, 24, of Tacoma, Wash. It was reported that the Taliban fighters had no information of the helicopter's flight path and that they had been in the right place at the right time. Stock photos, 360 images, vectors and videos On Aug. 6, 2011, insurgent forces in Afghanistan shot down an American aircraft. Lee is 36 now, a civil attorney in Dallas, a world away from Afghanistan. The SEALs who assaulted Osama bin Ladens compound were drawn from Naval Special Warfare Development Groups Red Squadron, according to several sources in the special operations community.. Approaching to land or having just taken off, the craft is flying slow and low, so it presents a tempting target. At that moment, Extortion 17 slowed to 58 mph, at no more than 150 feet, approaching a spot framed by trees and mud-brick huts, and "sparkled" by the infrared designator on an AC-130 gunship. The group fired two or three RPG rounds from a two-story building, the second striking one of the helicopter's three aft rotor blades. On August 6, 2011, the final flight of Extortion 17 resulted in the single deadliest incident for the US military during the War in Afghanistan. In mid-2011, combined with a U.S. Army aviation battalion, they had spent weeks conducting operations nearly every other night in Wardak and surrounding provinces south of Kabul to capture or kill Taliban forces, disrupt attack plots, and deny them sanctuary on this strategic approach to Kabul City. Call Sign Extortion 17: The Shoot-Down of SEAL Team Six is a 2015 non-fiction expose, written by best-selling author and former U.S. Navy JAG Officer Don Brown, about the 2011 Chinook shootdown in Afghanistan of a United States Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopter. This remains the greatest single loss of life to Naval Special Warfare since the Afghan War started in 2001. When the shock subsided, questions arose and persisted. 130 Extortion 17 ideas | extortion, seal team 6, navy seals Extortion 17 119 Pins 9y K Collection by Kim&Pauly Us Soldiers Troops Fallen Soldiers Military Personnel Military Men American Soldiers American Heroes Naval Special Warfare Fallen Heroes So many unsettling details are coalescing with the resurgence of Extortion 17. 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. On the anniversary of the Extortion 17 tragedy, we remember the heroic men who were felled rushing into battle, as they had done hundreds of times . Regarding the downing of Extortion 17, all of the DEVGRU Operators aboard were members of the Gold Squadron. In 2006, he was called into Afghanistan, where he turned 25. One rocket struck a rotor blade, causing the aircraft to crash almost instantly. On August 6th, 2011, the helicopter was fired upon and shot down by a previously undetected group of Taliban fighters. In order to speed disembarkation, all troops were loaded on a single CH-47D helicopter for transport; the other Chinook would approach the landing zone second as a decoy. Tragically, as Extortion 17 was nearing its landing zone, Taliban fighters, hidden in a building, fired two or three rocket-propelled grenades at close range, leaving the pilot no chance to perform evasive maneuvers. The helicopters are capacious and fast, and they can perform well in Afghanistans performance-degrading high altitudes and heat. God bless all of them- the bravest of the brave. We continue our work at the Museum so that theirservice and sacrifice will never be forgotten. And I condemn anyone who would dare denigrate the flag of the greatest country in the world which is made so by the heroic actions of these great men. A catastrophic crash seemed unavoidable. However, the Afghan government forces did not occupy the base, which was seized by the Taliban shortly after the departure of American forces. On the night of 8 August 2011, an F-16 dropped four GBU-54 "Laser JDAM" bombs on the man, his accomplice and four associates in the Chak Valley, which lies to the west of the Tangi Valley. He would eventually do two tours and become commander of a Chinook unit during his second deployment in 2011. Extortion 17 and 16 werent MH-47s and their crews were not Night Stalkers. While Benghazi resulted in four American deaths, Extortion 17 resulted in 38 deaths, including nearly two dozen Navy SEALs. This remains the greatest single loss of life to Naval Special Warfare since the Afghan War started in 2001. The downing of Extortion 17 spurred a number of conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the shootdown was revenge for bin Laden's death. First, the Obama administration's Defense Department's crash report stated that there were no eyes in the sky over the Chinook . So much of the war is fought in areas where these helicopters have to fly at high altitudes, where the thin air can strain the performance of the engines and rotor blades, said Ed Darack, author of the recently published book, The Final Mission of Extortion 17: Special Ops, Helicopter Support, SEAL Team Six and the Deadliest Day of the U.S. War in Afghanistan. It does not fly in a straight line, and there is no way to know what exact path it will takejust a fairly good idea of its trajectory.. One of the things I vowed, I will never forget. 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. Lee heard the call, and he knew what it meant. One AH-64 crew, after identifying the men as enemy combatants, fired on them with their gunships 30mm cannon, killing six. Intelligence had revealed Tahir to be the senior Taliban chief of the Tangi Valley region, with probable ties to upper-echelon Taliban leadership in Pakistan. The Joint Combat Assessment Team report further noted that despite a robust deck of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets, none identified the location from which the shooters fired prior to the helicopter downing. LZ is ice, transmitted one of the Rangers on the ground, indicating the landing zone was free of enemy activity. He was probably in the top 1 percent of Army aviators, Lee said. It is considered the worst loss of American lives in a single incident in the Afghanistan campaign, surpassing Operation Red Wings in 2005. No evidence has emerged to support any of these claims. Lightboxes. Campbell was one of 30 Americans killed when a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, with the call sign Extortion 17, crashed in Afghanistan. [9][10][11] After a 20-minute flight (around 23:00), the two Chinook helicopters landed near the compound ostensibly containing Tahir, offloaded the Ranger platoon and returned to base. Their deaths are the greatest single loss of life ever suffered by the U.S. Special Operations community in the 24-year history of the U.S. Special Operations Command.[5][22][15][23]. The events that unfolded that night are commonly referred to as Extortion 17, the call sign for the helicopter transporting the special operations personnel. Lees wife, Christy, hoped the news would bring a sudden end to the war. | Cookie Settings, 5,000-Year-Old Tavern With Food Still Inside Discovered in Iraq, Archaeologists Discover Wooden Spikes Described by Julius Caesar, The Surprisingly Scientific Roots of Monkey Bars, Kids Start Forgetting Early Childhood Around Age 7, Artificial Sweetener Tied to Risk of Heart Attack and Stroke, Study Finds. The next night, the pair had orders to drop off more troops in the same spot. Theyre going after in very hostile environments, who know the terrain very well, who know the battlescape very well, Darack said. Their target: an Afghan named Qari Tahir and his group of fighters. The helicopter made its last radio transmission stating that it was one minute away from the landing zone, then descended to an altitude of 100150ft (3046m) and slowed to a speed of 50kn (58mph; 93km/h) as it approached the landing zone. At 23:30, one of the Apache support helicopters engaged in a brief skirmish with a different group of eight Taliban fighters 400m (440yd) north of the compound, killing six. Director Franois Garcia Writer Sandeep Panesar Stars Robert O'Neill (archive footage) Patricia Economo Enrique Garcia Sat 6 Aug 2011 19.08 EDT. And to this day, people are still debating what really happened. [11], By 16:25, all of the remains were taken from the crash site via ground convoy and transported to Combat Outpost Sayyid Abad. The official statement from U.S. Central Command stated that a Taliban fighter scored a lucky shot with a rocket-propelled grenade. [43][45], 2011 Afghanistan Boeing Chinook shootdown, United States Air Force Combat Control Team, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), Tangi Valley, Wardak province, Afghanistan, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, Naval Special Warfare Development Group's, Explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) technicians, United States House Oversight Subcommittee on National Security, Call Sign Extortion 17: The Shoot-Down of SEAL Team Six, List of aviation accidents and incidents in the war in Afghanistan, "Elite Force Died in Bid to Save Comrades", "Taliban shot that brought down American Chinook killing 30 US commandos was 'lucky', officials believe", "Taliban shoot down US helicopter in Afghanistan; 38 killed", "Worst US loss of life in Afghan war as helicopter crash kills 38", "US military helicopter crash in Afghanistan kills 38", Executive Summary (Crash of CH-47D Aircraft in Wardak Province, Afghanistan on 6 August 2011), "Families suspect SEAL Team 6 crash was inside job on worst day in Afghanistan", "DOD Identifies Service Members Killed in CH-47 Crash", "Tragedy devastates special warfare community", "Friends remember three area soldiers killed in Afghan crash", "Chinook Crewmembers Line of Duty Deaths", "US special forces Afghan helicopter downed by Taliban", "Chopper crash kills 31 U.S. troops, 7 Afghans", "Copter Downed by Taliban Fire; Elite U.S. Unit Among Dead", "Impact on special forces of Navy Seals helicopter loss", "SEAL Team 6 Families Believe the 2011 Chinook Shootdown in Afghanistan was Planned | Navy SEALs Blog by USNavySEALs.com", "Army delayed Chinook helicopter's black box until it was too late", "Obama stonewalls SEAL Team 6 helicopter crash probe, watchdog says", "US helicopter shot down in Afghanistan was sent in after night raid went awry", "US military probes deadly Afghan helicopter crash", "What happened on night of deadly Afghanistan helicopter crash? All topics Extortion 17 Documentary Soon after US Navy Cryptologist Michael Strange and the elite SEAL Team 6 capture and kill Bin Laden, they are deployed to Afghanistan, where their Chinook is shot down. Among the 38 occupants inside the Chinook were some of the most highly trained and battle-seasoned fighters in the U.S. military, including 15 commandos from the Navys SEAL Team 6, the unit that three months earlier had killed Osama bin Laden. The circumstances surrounding the events of Extortion 17 are tragic. [45] McChrystal cited a previous "overreliance on firepower and force protection" and the need to reduce civilian casualties and win the cooperation of the local population. But why? Registration on or use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Service. In March 2002, two MH-47s were downed by machine gun and rocket-propelled grenade fire while close to ground level. Why did it happen? A chief warrant officer 5, a member of the Colorado National Guard, Carter had over 4,500 flying hours, including more than 1,000 hours during combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. [7][27][28] During the battle, American forces observed a small group of Taliban trying to flee the scene. That assault team captured Tahirs compound and some of his men. But over time, they became more disturbing, including one that suggested the Taliban had been tipped off by someone inside the Afghan government as revenge for bin Ladens killing. Extortion 17 and its 38 occupants would not return. In the afternoon of 6 August, a flash flood swept through the area, washing away parts of the wreckage. On this day 11 years ago, 30 American military servicemen and a U.S. military dog were killed when a CH-47 Chinook helicopter-call sign Extortion 17-was shot down in Afghanistan. He said that insurgents had assumed a strong tactical position without knowledge of the helicopter's flight path. Justin Buddy Lee will never forget that night six years ago. According to his book, No Easy Day (detailing his participation in Operation Neptune Spear), Mark Owen (the pen name of former SEAL Operator Matt Bissonnette) stated that nearly all of the Operators on that mission were handpicked from Red Squadron. Originally just two people, the group eventually swelled to a total of nine or ten fighters, and the special operations task force commander and the Immediate Reaction Force commander became concerned that it might include Tahir. The group fired 2-3 RPG rounds from a two-story building from a location some 220 meters south of the helicopter. On board the Chinook CH-47D were 15 members of SEAL Team Six, 15 SEAL Team Six Support personnel, 1 Bomb Dog, 7 . Since the shootdown of Extortion 17, the military has continued to gain vital experience and equipment to enable an ever greater understanding of an enemy force, aiming to know every combatant and potential combatant and his weapon system before a raid. Photo: We pay Tribute Chief Petty Officer Nicholas H. Null Operation Extortion 17 August 6, 2011 You may leave a condolence for his family on our YouTube channel https://youtu.be/L2lB37qizaI Comebacks Photo Photo: We pay Tribute to Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Stephen M. Mills Operation Extortion 17 August 6, 2011 Battalion Regiment Warrant Officer John W. Brown, 33, of Tallahassee, Florida, Staff Sgt. Play FALLEN ANGEL Call Sign: Extortion 17. To address some unanswered questions, the committee received briefings, classified and unclassified, on the operational component leading up to the loss of the 30 servicemen and eight Afghan nationals and the postmortem handling of the 30 American servicemen on Extortion 17. David Tarrant, The Dallas Morning News Conspiracy theories started almost immediately. What we saw is that if the enemy knew where you were going to attack, they would back some guys with RPGs off 500 meters or so, to shoot during an ingress, Glover explains. Flying to the Tangi Valley for the second time, Extortion 17 and 16 took a different route, approaching from the northwest instead of the south. [11], At 02:00, the special operations task force commander and the Immediate Reaction Force commander decided to add additional (non-SEAL) reinforcements, increasing the size of the team to 33. This tactic was highly successful; hundreds of operations were conducted without firing a shot for years. When the Boeing CH-47D Chinook helicopter was hit, all 38 onboard were instantly killed. It was the day we learned our son Aaron and other American warriors had lost their lives in a helo crash in Afghanistan. In order to prevent this, American forces called in for support. American, French and Afghan National Police forces carried out a three-day sweep of the area, and the area was then deemed secure. (Smithsonian Books, September 2017). The image released and purported to be Bin Laden was a blended image of an old Bin Laden pic and an image of a different terrorist that was killed in battle. Extortion 17 is a name etched in our minds as one of the worst losses our military has ever experienced. Where was the Chinook's black box cockpit recorder? The crew of Slasher 02, the AC-130 circling above, flipped the switch on their powerful light. During the Ranger insertion earlier that night, the CH-47D had approached from the south; this time, it approached from the northwest. The theories suggest that Afghan forces leaked information to the Taliban about the mission. The Tangi Valley is a strategic terrain that connects the two primary highways that lead to Kabul. A hearing was set to get answers to questions surrounding the high-profile shoot-down of an American helicopter in Afghanistan and how the remains of the fallen service members were handled. Through sensors on manned and unmanned aircraft, U.S. forces observing the mud walls and terraces of the village saw new groups of fighters gathering and maneuvering.
Grecotel Travel Agent Rates,
Letter To Little Sister From Big Brother,
Bavaria Germany Rizal,
When A Capricorn Man Respects You,
Stanly News And Press Arrests,
Articles E
