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For helicopter crews in Afghanistan, the most dangerous times are landing and taking off. Air Force C-17 Crashes Just After Takeoff in Alaska | Dangerous Aerobatics (With Real Video) TheFlightChannel 2.1M views 1 year ago Feature History - Chinese Civil War Feature History 1.9M views. What are the odds? The tempo of the missions did not decrease. Restrained by strict rules of engagement in force at the time, the helicopter crews could not have fired without a strong indication of hostile intent. He would not have hesitated to fly with any of them. The 30 American Servicemen killed in action (KIA) with the downing of Extortion 17. Some news stories reported that investigators couldnt find the helicopters black box, referring to the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. The following passage, published in The Navy Times, seems to support that assertion. Today. In March 2009, the U.S. 10th Mountain Division established a base in Tangi Valley after increased Taliban activity in the area. Some sources state that at the shootdown, the two AH-64 Apache helicopters were engaged in tracking another Taliban group and were thus unable to provide surveillance (of the landing zone and infiltration route) and fire support the inbound CH-47D helicopter carrying the Navy SEAL team. [35] The Seattle Times and The New York Times also reported this information. The IRF also included two SEALs from another team, five Navy special operations support personnel, three Air Force special tactics airmen, seven Afghan National Army commandos, a translator, and a combat assault dog. With a keen understanding of the propaganda value of downing Coalition helicopters, the Taliban single them out as targets. The US soldiers killed in the 2011 Afghanistan Boeing Chinook shoot-down with the call sign Extortion 17 (Photo: XY) SGT Alexander J. Bennett SPC Spencer Duncan (youngest onboard) CWO Bryan J. Nichols Eleven U.S. servicemen aboard Extortion 17 entered the military after the 9/11 attacks, answering the call to arms as so many brave Americans have done throughout the history of our great country. Insurgents fired at the Chinook, severed one of. As for himself, he speaks out about Extortion 17 because he wants to remember the men on that mission. [9][11], Almost an hour later (01:50), the aviation brigade commander approved a new landing zone for infiltration of the SEAL team. [11] At 22:37 (local time) on the night of 5 August, a platoon of 47 U.S. Army Rangers left a forward operating base in Logar Province via two CH-47D transport helicopters, one of which would later be involved in the accident. It was the day we learned our son Aaron and other American warriors had lost their lives in a helo crash in Afghanistan. (Smithsonian Books, September 2017). The team boarded Extortion 17 with Dave Carter and Bryan Nichols at the controls. Pinterest. Six minutes from their estimated landing time, Extortion 16 broke away from the lead Chinook and orbited at a location close enough to help if needed. The 30 Navy SEALs and other Special Forces personnel, along with the Helicopter flight crew because American Military and Political leaders threw these men under the bus the enemy was driving and then covered it all up with lies and deceit. Photo by Sgt. #neverforgotten #screwedbygovt #demmandanswers. 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. However, the Afghan government forces did not occupy the base, which was seized by the Taliban shortly after the departure of American forces. If this was survivable, that was the right crew to have. Create an account. On board the Chinook CH-47D were 15 members of SEAL Team Six, 15 SEAL Team Six Support personnel, 1 Bomb Dog, 7 . The CH-47 "Chinook" was carrying some of this nation's bravest and most capable military . He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), Grand Island, Nebraska, Sgt. It just wasnt.. But Tahir and a group of his fighters escaped. 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. Planners then chose a new landing zone for the IRF, but it was large enough to accommodate only one Chinook. Campbell was one of 30 Americans killed when a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, with the call sign Extortion 17, crashed in Afghanistan. To lose even one precious life is too many, and the United States lost 38 soldiers that day. Approaching to land or having just taken off, the craft is flying slow and low, so it presents a tempting target. 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.. Some 30 seconds later, one of the AH-64 Apache helicopters in the area reported: Fallen Angel.. Our area of operation was the entire country of Iraq, and every mission was at night, says David Pat Gates, a pilot with Carters unit , the 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment (2-135th), a Colorado Army National Guard unit based in Aurora, Colorado. "One. U.S. Special Operations Command possesses its own specialized ChinooksMH-47sflown by the ultra-secretive 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the Night Stalkers. The MH-47s modifications include inflight refueling probes, additional and upgraded sensors, more powerful engines, and more powerful defensive weapons than their conventional counterparts. I find it extremely suspicious that, after the alleged killing of Osama Bin Laden, there was a very suspicious burial at sea for a covered corpse that was alleged to be Bin Laden. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. It was brought down by multiple shots. Photo by Jake Simkin for Coffee or Die Magazine. [36][37], After the shootdown of Extortion 17, the insurgent responsible used a two-way radio to brag to others about the act. 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. I thought I hit a tree,he said. The official statement from U.S. Central Command stated that a Taliban fighter scored a lucky shot with a rocket-propelled grenade. All of them were men of courage, integrity, and honor. Landing in deserts or mountainsides, the helicopter rotors kick up clouds of sand and dust, causing brownouts that can blind a pilot. That same day he obtained a medical waiver he needed to pursue an Army commission to serve an eight-year hitch before going to law school. The aircraft jerked. Captain Marquez claims that had the AC-130 been allowed to fire on the remaining enemy insurgents, Extortion 17 would not have been shot down. The duo may also have had no ties to Tahir or any of his suspected fighters, and attacked the helicopter on their own. And while all military helicopters carry countermeasures for guided missiles, nothing can interdict the dumb luck of an unguided RPG round sailing through the air. 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. The mission was flown by conventional pilots flying unmodified CH-47Ds. On a moonless night, an Army Chinook helicopter swept low over the Tangi Valley, a strip of forbidding terrain in eastern Afghanistan teeming with Taliban and located just 35 miles south of Kabul. So many unsettling details are coalescing with the resurgence of Extortion 17. NFTs Simplified > Uncategorized > extortion 17 crash photos. David Tarrant, The Dallas Morning News And now, the government wants to make the Taliban legitamet. Learnt of this today, very surprising after ladens raid was covered in the media here. 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. 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. As they started their descent, Lee heard a loud popping noise. So if there was a added black box installed on this Aircraft there should be a maintenance record? August 6, 2022 marks 11 years since Extortion 17. The Afghan soldiers were an essential part of the package; they were trained to move with our forces to the target. The basis of the provocative hit military documentary Fallen Angel Call Sign: Extortion 17. Copyright 2023 | National Navy UDT-SEAL Museum, The Museum is a 501(c)(3) organization. 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. 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. When the Boeing CH-47D Chinook helicopter was hit, all 38 onboard were instantly killed. Its a math problem. Spec Ops Magazine 2023 All Rights Reserved. Just three months earlier, members of a counterpart SEAL Team 6 squadron successfully raided a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and killed Osama bin Laden. We were on goggles the whole time. [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. A source from the Navys special operations community described the reaction as Shock and disbelief. 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. Director Franois Garcia Writer Sandeep Panesar Stars Robert O'Neill (archive footage) Patricia Economo Enrique Garcia While classification veils the specifics of these tactics, particularly for special operations raids, manned gunships can detect potential threats through a range of sensors and immediately attack if needed. God bless all of them- the bravest of the brave. 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. For the last two years, hes been an attorney with the law firm Jackson Walker. Warnings from her crew to turn the Chinook back or cancel their mission went unheeded. One rocket struck a rotor blade, causing the aircraft to crash almost instantly. [34] Kevin Sieff and Greg Jaffe of The Washington Post reported that U.S. officials confirmed the deaths, including 22 SEALs. Ill try to reply the best I can. [citation needed] Doubts about this story were raised by families and other concerned citizens despite the fact that the Navy SEAL team aboard Extortion 17 was a different squadron than that which had killed Osama bin Laden three months earlier. The "had Seal team 6 killed" is a likely reference to what's known as the "Extortion 17" incident, the August 2011 tragedy in which a Chinook military helicopter was shot down in Afghanistan,. 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. Articles may contain affiliate links which enable us to share in the revenue of any purchases made. Available for both RF and RM licensing. On this day 11 years ago, 30 American military servicemen and a U.S. military dog were killed when a CH-47 Chinook helicoptercall sign Extortion 17was shot down in Afghanistan. Justin Buddy Lee will never forget that night six years ago. Six weeks into his deployment, Lee experienced his worst day as a helicopter pilot to that point. You also want to come in from a different direction for the element of surprise.. Not feelin it! Sometimes the enemy succeeds in delivering one of these To whom it may concern projectiles. Stock photos, 360 images, vectors and videos. Capable of loitering overhead for hours undetected, small fleets of unmanned craft passed imagery to mission planners before and during the raid at Juy Zarin, allowing them to recognize individual fighters, learn their habits, pinpoint where they slept, and identify the types of weapons they carried. 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. Theres no precedent for this. Sgt. Im a 25 year veteran involved in many support missions and I find this downing of Ext 17 very suspect indeed! There are more operations than can be supported by the 160th at any given time," says Major Matthew Brady, a former 160th pilot and company commander. On 6 August 2011, a U.S. CH-47D Chinook military helicopter operating with the call sign Extortion 17 (pronounced "one-seven") was shot down while transporting a Quick Reaction Force attempting to reinforce a Joint Special Operations Command unit of the 75th Ranger Regiment in the Tangi Valley in Maidan Wardak province, southwest of Kabul, Afghanistan. Its the worst day in our history by a mile.. In March 2002, two MH-47s were downed by machine gun and rocket-propelled grenade fire while close to ground level. Intelligence on August 6th indicated Qari Tahir was in Tangi Valley, just a short helicopter flight from the SEAL base camp. [11][24] These reports were erroneous; the CH-47D airframe does not contain flight recorders, although the MH-47 variant does have a flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. [1][5][6][7][8] At 30 American military personnel killed, the shootdown of Extortion 17 represents the greatest single-incident loss of American lives in Operation Enduring Freedom Afghanistan, surpassing the 16 lost in the downing of Turbine 33, a 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) MH-47 helicopter, during Operation Red Wings on 28 June 2005.[2]. Connor Mendez, courtesy of U.S. Army. Sgt. His account of the brave pilots, crew, and passengers of Extortion 17 . But we are still sending people to another country to fight, and we need to understand why were doing that, he said. A senior Afghan government official, speaking anonymously, said that Taliban commander Qari Tahir had fed American 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. In June 2005, a rocket-propelled grenade connected with the rear transmission of a 160th MH-47E Chinook as it attempted to come to a hover, downing it; all 16 on board were killed. Gold Star father Bill Vaughn had a heartfelt message to American "leaders" while discussing a documentary that investigates the Extortion 17 helicopter crash in Afghanistan. Courtesy . Through the goggles, the landing zone shone brilliantly. The shootdown was the single, deadliest loss of U.S. forces in the war. Six weeks later, at around 10:40 p.m., an assault team of Army Rangers and Afghan special operations forces were dropped into an LZ on a mission to capture or kill a Taliban commander named Qari Tahir, who had been responsible for a series of attacks and ambushes in the Tangi Valley, not far from Shank. Lee heard the call, and he knew what it meant. The crash is referred to as Extortion 17 by the callsign of the CH-47 Chinook helicopter involved in the crash. His father Billy Vaughn recounted Thursday a phone call from his son following the White House . We were told at that time we were the first unit to make it through a rotation without having anyone killed.. The men who serve in the American military are the finest! Oct 26, 2016 - Explore Concerned Citizen's board "EXTORTION 17", followed by 829 people on Pinterest. All hand picked by Red Squadron really makes your neck hair standup! Extortion 17 is a name etched in our minds as one of the worst losses our military has ever experienced. Photo by Sgt. Extortion 17 and its 38 occupants would not return. [11], The 30 American deaths represent the greatest loss of U.S. military lives in a single incident in the war in Afghanistan that began in 2001. On Aug. 6, 2011, insurgent forces in Afghanistan shot down an American aircraft. 29 Photos Documentary On a moonless night, an Army helicopter carrying 17 members of the elite Navy SEAL Team 6, the unit that killed Osama Bin Laden, is shot down in Afghanistan. Extortion 17 sped alone toward the landing zone. 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. (U.S. Army photo by Rachel Larue/Arlington National Cemetery/released). In The Final Mission of Extortion 17, Ed Darack debunks this theory and others and uncovers the truth behind this mysterious tragedy. Find the perfect extortion17 stock photo, image, vector, illustration or 360 image. The helicopter fell from the sky, killing all 38 on board. On his first deployment, he felt fortunate to be surrounded by veteran pilots he could learn from. Lee, now a captain, was placed in command of a Chinook helicopter unit at Forward Operating Base Shank. So the whole team went in one Chinook helicopter Extortion 17. The hardest LZ Id ever been into, Lee said. The worst of the wounded was one of Lees crew members, who suffered what was later diagnosed as a severe traumatic brain injury. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) The downing of a Chinook helicopter gunship (known by its call sign Extortion 17) in Afghanistan on August 6, 2011, has for years been shrouded in mystery, with the . We were supporting special operations, but not to the degree of the 160th. The events that unfolded that night are commonly referred to as Extortion 17, the call sign for the helicopter transporting the special operations personnel.