Word: afghanistans
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Helicopters are not shot down in battle very much in either place [Iraq or Afghanistan]," says Brookings Institution defense analyst Michael O'Hanlon. He and his colleagues are keeping running tallies of U.S. fatalities in both theaters. While 5% of U.S. deaths in Iraq have been caused by helicopter crashes - 216 out of 4,348 - the total is 12% in Afghanistan - 101 of 866 - even before Monday's losses. "The main issues [responsible for the higher rate of helicopter-crash casualties in Afghanistan] have to do with terrain, weather and of course frequency of use," O'Hanlon says. (See pictures...
...over the past year doubled its number of helicopters based in Afghanistan to about 225, but troop numbers have risen even faster, making for a more acute chopper shortage. Helicopters are swift but delicate machines. The physics of flight make them inherently unstable, and therefore less reliable, than fixed-wing aircraft which generate their lift from stationary wings instead of egg-beater-like rotor blades. More critically, chopper pilots are commonly expected to fly in hot weather at high altitudes, where less-dense air offers them less control over their aircraft...
...Force Captain Matthew Miller wrote about the challenges of flying in Afghanistan after returning from a four-month deployment there in 2007. His medevac unit, from Georgia's Moody Air Force Base, had lost three helicopters and seven crew members in the two wars. Enemy fire had been a factor in none of the Afghan crashes. "In Iraq, helicopter pilots face a greater prospect of being shot at by ground fire," Miller wrote. "In Afghanistan, the greatest threat is the terrain." He described flying in Afghanistan as "'graduate level' piloting more challenging than cruising over the flatlands of Iraq...
...Read "Moving Troops to Afghanistan Harder Than Getting Them...
...Laikipia now finds itself caught up in the politics of faraway warmaking. As Britain increases its troop levels in Afghanistan (numbers there have doubled to about 10,000 in the past three years), it has ramped up its training exercises in Kenya, with more than 3,000 soldiers passing through the region each year. The army says Laikipia is perhaps its best training ground because the conditions there - high altitude, extreme heat, hilly terrain - are remarkably similar to those found in Afghanistan...