One killed and two injured as Black Hawk helicopter flown by elite Night Stalkers force crashes on 'hard landing'


  • Helicopter had been making its final approach to Georgia airfield
  • Three-man crew were returning from nighttime training exercise

By Daily Mail Reporter

PUBLISHED: 17:33 EST, 16 January 2014 | UPDATED: 18:35 EST, 16 January 2014



A member of an elite Army helicopter unit was killed and two crew members were injured when their helicopter crashed at a Georgia base last night.

The crew of the MH-60 Black Hawk helicopter were returning from a routine training flight when they made a 'hard landing' at the Hunter Airfield in Savannah at about 11.30pm.

The three-man team on board were part of the elite Night Stalkers regiment, which trains pilots to fly dangerous nighttime missions, including the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.


A Black Hawk helicopter, similar to the one pictured above, had a hard landing that killed one of its crew members on Wednesday


The names of the soldier who died and the two who were injured have not yet been released, but an Army spokesman said they had been returning to base after a training exercise.


The crew were part of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, which flew the Navy Seals into the Pakistan compound where Bin Laden was hiding.

'They were on their final approach. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary,' Army Major Allen Hill, a spokesman for the aviation unit, said.

Despite the helicopter landing with enough force to kill one of its three-man crew Major Hill said it had not crashed.



The fatal incident happened as the helicopter tried to land at Hunter Army Airfield in Georgia

'The difference is in a hard landing the pilot had more control, as opposed to a crash which would have been something more severe,' Major Hill said.
The helicopter came down close to the main gate of Hunter Army Airfield, although Major Hill couldn't say if it had landed on the runway or grass.

An investigation into the cause of the crash is underway.



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...d-landing.html


Hope they weren't targeted..So sorry , RIP...