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Army general: It was supposed to have been a routine operation -- a night air assault mission -- which 25th Infantry Division soldiers had just performed a week earlier.
‘Everything we do
is complex’
The crash of two helicopters shows
how hazardous military
training can be
Posthumous promotion for victim
By Gregg K. Kakesako
Star-BulletinBut as Brig. Gen. William Caldwell, assistant division commander for operations and training, noted yesterday, "everything we do is complex." Monday's air assault turned into twin helicopter tragedies, killing six soldiers and hospitalizing four others.
Last week, the division moved without incident more than 800 soldiers 15 miles from Schofield Barracks to a landing zone in the Kahuku Military Training Area, a few miles from Sunset Beach near the Kahuku motocross track.
"We used the same aircraft," Caldwell, "the same air crews and the same location. Both would have been done at night."
On Monday night, 800 soldiers were going to repeat the night maneuver as the division prepared to end its annual two-week-long "Lightning Thrust Warrior" exercise. It is designed to prepare one of the two brigades stationed at Schofield Barracks for its May deployment to the Joint Readiness Training Center at Folk Polk, La.
The night was clear with winds just under 15 knots -- within the Army's safety limits. Showers in the Koolaus over the LZ "X-Strip" were light to moderate.
Army aviators, wearing special night vision goggles that intensify ambient light into greens and whites, had no trouble seeing the grassy landing zone carved on a small bluff surrounded by short trees.
The UH-60 Black Hawks carrying the division's infantry soldiers were grouped in fours. By 7:40 p.m. Monday, two flights of eight Black Hawks had made the 12-minute journey and deposited their cargo of soldiers and equipment.Eighty to 100 soldiers plus cargo and equipment, including artillery pieces, had been safely transported up to that point.
Caldwell, who was in the air monitoring Monday's operation, said the accident occurred when two Black Hawks -- 660 feet shy of the LZ "X-Strip" and about 100 feet off the ground -- slowed down for a landing.
The Black Hawk carrying a sling load of what was supposed to simulate an 8,000-pound cargo of ammunition and another one with a 7,500-pound Humvee dangling below it ran into trouble.
Caldwell didn't say if a collision occurred, although one witness sitting in the helicopter carrying the ammunition told the Star-Bulletin he felt his aircraft being hit. Sgt. 1st Class Leslie Frye said it could have been the sling or the humvee that tangled 13 to 14 feet below and came into contact with the main rotor blade of his Black Hawk.
The six dead Schofield soldiers were either crew members or passengers on the Black Hawk transporting the Humvee. Killed were Maj. Robert Olson, who was the 2nd Battalion, 11th Field Artillery Regiment's operations officer and his Humvee driver, Specialist Rafael Olvera- Rodriguez.
Also killed in the accident were two pilots -- Chief Warrant Officer George Perry and Chief Warrant Officer George Montgomery -- and two crew members -- Sgt. Thomas Barber and Specialist Bob MacDonald.
All four belonged to the 25th Infantry Division (Light) 25th Aviation Regiment.
Yesterday, as the media toured the crash site from the air, the Humvee was on its back with its wheels in the air near the downed Black Hawk, which ended on its left side in a gulch.
Caldwell said the area was kept intact at the request of investigators from the U.S. Army Safety Center at Fort Rucker, Ala. The wreckage of the two Black Hawks is expected to remain in the remote Kahuku site until next week when they will be transferred to a hangar at Wheeler Army Airfield for further investigation.
An initial accident report to Maj. Gen. James Dubik, the 25th's commanding general, is expected to be completed within three weeks.
Caldwell said the ammunition-carrying Black Hawk, with a crew of four and seven other soldiers, made what he described as "a controlled crash," landing on its belly on a red dirt road.
But Caldwell said that is what a Black Hawk pilot is supposed to do in an emergency and that the aircraft's seats are designed to break away to give passengers ease in leaving the aircraft.
The other Black Hawk, which had carried the Humvee and which had no survivors, lay more than 250 feet to the east. Neither aircraft was damaged by fire.
Although Monday's accident was the Army's worst training accident in Hawaii, Caldwell and other Army officials said this was the first major fatality involving a Black Hawk since it was brought into the 25th Division's arsenal in 1985.
Forty-one Black Hawks are maintained by the division's 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment.
Flags across the state were flown at half-staff yesterday for the accident victims.
Caldwell noted: "Military operations in peace and war are dangerous. We saw that last (Monday) night ... It's tough. What it does is that it brings home to you the fact what each and every soldier does for his country.
"They understand that there is apparent risk involved in anything we do even in any of our training.
"It makes you realize that everybody is susceptible ... It brings home how dangerous our business can be."
Mayor Jeremy Harris said the fatal helicopter crash "reminds us of the danger in which members of the United States Armed Forces are placed, day in and day out, in times of peace and in times of war. Leaders, churches lend
sympathy, supportStar-Bulletin staff
The mayor and other community members offered sympathy and support to the Army in the aftermath of the Monday crash that killed six men and injured 11 others.
"It's a very sad thing, our deepest sympathy to everybody in their units and their families, said Gorden Kanemaru, president of the Wahiawa Community and Business Association.
In a practical gesture of support, the congregations of Mililani Presbyterian Church and Christ Lutheran Church in Mililani decided to donate the offering collected at their joint Ash Wednesday service for the relief of the victims' families.
Posthumous A promotion that would have advanced Sgt. Thomas E. Barber's military career will enhance the death benefits for his young family.
promotion for
crash victim
The advancement will
enhance the benefits for
his young familyBy Mary Adamski
Star-BulletinThe Army yesterday announced the posthumous promotion to staff sergeant for the helicopter crew chief who died with five others aboard the UH-60 Black Hawk aircraft that crashed Monday during field exercises.
Barber, 27, of the 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment, was assigned to helicopters throughout his eight years in the Army. He had also achieved recognition as a military master diver and attended school to qualify as equal opportunity representative in his unit. Born in Champlin, Minn., he was married and had two young sons.
Services at the Schofield Barracks post chapel tomorrow will remember the victims and their accomplishments in military service, the community and their families. The 25th Aviation Regiment will hold a 9 a.m. service, followed by an 11 a.m. service sponsored by the 11th Field Artillery Regiment.
The family of Maj. Robert L. Olson, a West Point graduate who was 14 years into an Army career that had included duty in Europe, Asia and the Persian Gulf, said he dreamed of returning to live in his home town of Big Falls, Minn.
Olson, 35, was due to be promoted to colonel in March, his sister Luann Abendroth told the International Falls Daily Journal, but was thinking about retiring from the military.
Olson had applied for a city engineer position in International Falls, school friend Duane Burmeister told the paper. "He said they said he was overqualified."
Olson was operations officer of the 2nd Battalion, 11th Field Artillery Regiment, "a significant responsibility," said his commander, Lt. Col. Wayne Detwiler. "He was very capable, a highly intelligent man, promoted more speedingly than his peers." He was on his second tour of duty in Hawaii.
Detwiler said Olson was a runner, "active in sports and his kids' sporting activities. He was very focused on his family and that carried over to his duty, serving as a fine example of a family man to the military community." Olson is survived by his wife, also an Army major, a son and a daughter.
Spec. Rafael Olvera-Rodriguez, also of the 2nd Battalion, 11th Field Artillery, was also due for promotion, said Sgt. Major Gerald Dunn. "He had just graduated from a primary leadership development course. I think he was planning to make an Army career.
Olvera-Rodriguez had been in Hawaii for three years, and was previously a cannoneer, Dunn said. "He was selected over his peers to be driver (for Major Olson). He liked to do sports, he was on the softball team." Born in El Paso, Texas, he is survived by his wife.
Also killed were pilots George P. Perry and Gregory I. Montgomery, and Black Hawk crew member Bob D. MacDonald, all members of the 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment. Chief Warrant Officer 2 Montgomery, 33, was born in Hesperia, Calif., and received a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of California. He joined the Army in 1994 and had been a UH-60 pilot since 1996. In addition to completing flight school, he had trained in aviation life support. He was not married.
Chief Warrant Officer 4 George P. Perry, 41, was battalion safety officer as well as UH-60 pilot. He grew up in Hawaii and graduated from St. Louis School, where he was a linebacker on the football team. In the Army for 17 years, he was assigned to Hawaii about a year ago. He is survived by his wife, Lovie, and two sons.
Spec. Bob D. MacDonald, of B Company, 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment, was from Alta Loma, Calif. According to the Associated Press, he was married and the father of young children. Further details about him were not available yesterday from his commander or the base public affairs office.