Firefight Lifeflight
WASHINGTON - Giving up his seat to a wounded soldier, a courageous Army officer strapped himself to the side of an Apache helicopter gunship that airlifted them out of a furious firefight in Iraq, the military said yesterday.
The Army called it an “unusual casualty evacuation,” but Chief Warrant Officer Allen Crist’s selfless act goes way beyond heroism.
…
Crist and Purtee, from Company B, 1st Battalion, 149th Aviation Regiment, were part of a four-Apache team that came to help U.S. troops pinned down under heavy fire in the flashpoint town of Ramadi, about 50 miles west of Baghdad.
The heavily armored Apaches, using their 30-mm. cannon and wing-mounted rocket pods and miniguns, destroyed two tractor-trailers used as cover by the insurgents. The Army said the barrage “caused secondary explosions,” indicating they were probably rigged as bombs.
As the battle dragged on, the Apaches took numerous hits from small-arms fire. The ground commander warned that he had a critically wounded soldier and that the medevac choppers had yet to arrive.
In a desperation move, Purtee and Crist landed their Apache in the middle of the firefight and put their daring, improvised plan into action.
After dropping off Jamaleldine at the field hospital, Crist and Purtee did not pause for congratulations.
They refueled, reloaded their weapons arsenal and flew back to rejoin the fight.
The rest here.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:07 am on Tuesday, July 3, 2007
14 Responses to “Firefight Lifeflight”
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July 3rd, 2007 at 11:26 am
Once again, I stand in awe of these people.
July 3rd, 2007 at 1:39 pm
I thought al-Anbar province was under control.
Guess not.
July 3rd, 2007 at 2:08 pm
Are those guys badasses, or what?
Makes you proud to be an American.
July 3rd, 2007 at 3:00 pm
Good work, but check out the ‘Rogue Gunner’ site for 17th January 07 - Royal Marines got there first.
July 3rd, 2007 at 8:32 pm
Way cool! Good to go, troops!
July 4th, 2007 at 12:00 am
what a contrast on the one hand we have Chief Warrant Officer Crist on the other “Alphie”!!! The very best and worst of America all on the one post.
Here is a wonderful act of courage and selflessness and Alphie’s contribution is some spurious political point scoring trying to infer that when the military pointed out that there has been wonderful progress in Al Anbar that this claim was there was zero violence. Anyone with even half a brain recognises there is still a serious fight going on in Al Anbar just that it is going vastly better than it was a year ago. Spare us your mean spirited nonsense Alphie. Spare yourself for that matter too.
July 4th, 2007 at 12:22 am
I guess we see what we want to see, nailgun.
I see poorly armed peasants willing to stand up and fight against Apache helicopters.
Badasses, indeed.
We need to leave.
July 4th, 2007 at 1:11 am
The pissant just cannot help being a petty little zero he is. Show him true heroes and he must whine and winge and try to wipe out the hero. We mustn’t have real heroes, you know, because that would mean that the pissant has a choice–and we all know the choice he’s made. He only shows the world what a craven little asshat he is.
I didn’t think you could get any smaller, little ant, but you’ve managed to do so.
July 4th, 2007 at 2:08 am
“Good work, but check out the ‘Rogue Gunner’ site for 17th January 07 - Royal Marines got there first.”
Here’s a link to the RM rescue story.
http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1247706,00.html
July 4th, 2007 at 2:33 am
Haha, salty,
Sorry if I think the guys taking on four of our multi-million dollar flying death machines with small arms showed as much bravery as the guys fighting behind them.
Not the usual report we get from the right of “cowardly” insurgents, is it?
July 4th, 2007 at 11:11 am
Reading these dialogs from the outside, but seldom participating, I have to say: you guys might consider just not responding to the nitwit.
July 4th, 2007 at 7:52 pm
Nope. It means that you’re still ignorant.
These aren’t poorly armed pesants. And we don’t send aviation assets to take out small groups wiht small arms.
I have no information for this specific engagement, but a CENTCOM release of the same day describes an aviation assault on a 120mm mortar position and a ZSU-1 near Iskandaria. That’s what aviation gets used for.
I know you’d rather beleive that these are farmers and merchants who are spontaneously taking up arms against us. It’s just not so. the mortar and armored vehicle cited above should be illustration of that.
July 5th, 2007 at 2:56 am
LMAO!
As in the ’60s song:
what’s it all about, Alphie?
You’ll never know, Alphie…
‘Cause your neurons don’t fire, Alphie!
July 5th, 2007 at 11:27 am
Video of heroic freedom fighters standing up to an Apache AH.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Apache-killing-Iraq.avi.ogg
Those 30mm cannons are great. After a guerrilla gets hit by them, you don’t have to worry about funeral expenses, ’cause there ain’t enough left to bury.