Mike Durant
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
blacked out.
They're on the move.
There's not much else you can do in a helicopter to prevent yourself from being shot down.
And they get hit by an RPG.
Goes up through the belly of the bird, explodes in the back.
Everybody in the back's killed instantly, the explosion.
The two pilots survive.
Bird's on fire.
They crash land in the city.
It's Dale Schrader and Perry Allman are their names.
And I think it's Dale that pulls Perry out.
I don't know for sure, but one helps get the other one out.
Everybody in the back's a lost cause.
The aircraft's on fire.
They get in an alleyway.
And again, I'm secondhand telling this story, but bottom line is they're engaging the Somalis.
There's a reaction force, but it's a ground reaction force back at the airfield.
So it's gonna be a few minutes before it gets to the crash site.
Burning Blackhawks tend to attract a lot of attention in the middle of a city of 800,000 people.
So they're fighting, they're shooting, they're evading.