One U.S. pilot killed, another injured in helicopter accident in western Poland

By David Rising

Associated Press

BERLIN – A U.S. Army helicopter crashed during night attack training in western Poland, killing one pilot and injuring the other, the U.S. Army’s V Corps said Wednesday.

Chief Warrant Officer III Michael E. Reece, 36, of Big Pine Key, Fla., was killed in Tuesday’s crash while practicing strikes behind enemy lines, said Army spokeswoman Alison Bettencourt. Reece was an experienced pilot with 15 years in the Army.

Co-pilot Chief Warrant Officer II Robert W. Rugg was in stable condition in the 107th Polish Military Hospital in Walcz. He was to be brought back to Germany, where V Corps is based. Rugg’s age and hometown were not immediately available.

Investigators from V Corps were on the scene, and a team of military experts from Fort Rucker, Ala., was expected to arrive Thursday afternoon to determine the cause of the crash.

The two-person Apache AH-64 attack helicopter was taking part in Victory Strike II, a training mission involving large helicopter assaults against mock enemy radar and missile installations about 75 miles from the training base. During the simulated attack exercise, pilots fly at treetop height, dodging and weaving to avoid simulated enemy missile attacks.

The helicopter went down during the last simulated attack of the exercise, Bettencourt said.

“It’s being called a hard landing, which means we’re not sure if the helicopter was in control when it went down or not,” she said.

It was not clear how long the helicopter had been in the air when it crashed, nor which man was flying the plane, Bettencourt said. Both crew members in Apaches are trained pilots.

The Army had grounded all Apaches in June after identifying a possible problem with the helicopter’s tail rotor assembly. The grounding was the third for the Apache fleet in two years.

Last December, the Apaches – which entered service with the U.S. Army in 1984 – were grounded after a flaw was discovered in a key component of the flight control system. They were also grounded in November 1999 to replace tail rotor bearings or to replace transmission parts.

All Apaches were deemed flight-worthy before the Victory Strike II exercise started.

Both pilots from Tuesday’s crash were part of the 2nd Squad, 6th Cavalry, of the 11th Attack Helicopter Regiment, based in Illesheim, Germany. The unit is part of V Corps, based in Heidelberg, Germany.

Reece is survived by his wife, two children and his parents.

The three-week exercise at the Drawsko Pomorskie and Wedrzyn training grounds in Poland, about 80 miles east of Berlin, was expected to continue through Saturday with live-fire exercises, Bettencourt said.

“Obviously for the soldiers, emotionally, this is pretty difficult, and we’re using today to look at the exercises and assess what to continue with,” she said. “But at this point we’re continuing with the exercise.”

Some 4,000 American and Polish troops have deployed for the exercise, which pits Apache attack helicopters against American and Soviet-era anti-aircraft weaponry in an exercise that mimics tactics that could be employed in Afghanistan in the U.S.-led fight against terrorism.

The exercise was planned before the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.