British Special forces downed by rocket ambush

AN RAF special forces aircraft that crashed in Iraq killing 10 servicemen was shot down by a volley of rockets or missiles while flying “fast and low” at 150ft, defence sources have disclosed.

The first few missiles deflected the defensive systems on the Hercules from the special forces flight of 47 Squadron, allowing the others to get through, the sources said.

They are believed to have concluded that as many as six missiles and rockets, possibly more, were aimed at the aircraft and that the height at which it was flying gave the pilot no room for manoeuvre to avoid all of them. The findings will be revealed in a RAF board of inquiry report due to be published next month.

The problem now for the RAF and its US allies is that insurgents in a number of campaigns — including Somalia, Afghanistan and Iraq — have shown that even the best technology and flying skills are no guarantee of safety.

source:
Times Online

[edit on 22/5/05 by Souljah]

Fated crew was used to working with special forces

The dead men were identified as eight members of the C-130K’s crew, an RAF squadron leader and an acting lance corporal in the Royal Signals.

It was only the Royal Signals who was SF not quite SAS (depending on how you look at it, i know the 22 guys dont class them as SAS) but part of there communications squadron either 264 or one of there TA sections

verify.timesonline.co.uk...

funny how the same paper reports it in 2 different versions

Originally posted by jayce
verify.timesonline.co.uk...

funny how the same paper reports it in 2 different versions

I remember there was a debate on, why this airplane crashed - bad weather, onboard bomb...

But we can see the report, saying it was hit my Multiple Missiles.

yeah i remember reading the report long time ago saying the missiles at first was used to direct the decoys and it was the last ones that actually hit the aircraft.. but the point i was making was that it was only one SF person onboard and the rest where the flight crew, ie technicians and flight engineers

Originally posted by yeehaa
rumours flying this side of the pond..(info is expensive, beers not as cheap as it used to be)

story no.1 from army guy, 1 pilot raf, 1 co pilot raf(australia) 8 sas/sbs guys


story no.2 from a raf guy( he was cheap, always knew raf was cheap skates, he coughed up just over a phone call)

story he had be told was.. the c-130 was full of brit sas and 2 A teams green berets?( he said yank special forces so im guessing) and some fancy VIP(s) c-130 was flying low... most likey with ramp down so the vip could get a nice view( civvys for ya) then no more c-130

after he told me it rang true. remember GWB said on the election day about us and brit loses. but no america soldiers died on sunday? right

from the orginal post about it. intresting eh


www.abovetopsecret.com...

that C130 is used for mainly comms for troops on the ground, it flys low for this reason, if you are able to find a 264 signal guy sure he will confirm this.... Ref story No 1 & 2 amazing what people will say if you pay them.

I dont buy this official story.

Here is my previous post on this topic, when this plane was shot down.

ok,
a plane, mainly used to transfer large amounts of troops, crashed.
the u.k. even after nearly two days now, does not give exact numbers of the personal killed in this crashed.

the plane, is the "workinghorse" for carrying troops from point a to b. it is made to carry between 64 - to 128 troops + a 3-9 man crew.
medias say up to 15 u.k. killed, but normally it carries 64 - 128 man.

but ok, lets say there where only 15 u.k. soldiers on board. - so what was the load of the plane then?
why does it fly from baghad to balad?
what is so extremly important for the military, that they do not transport it from baghdad to balad by truck or train?

and
when flying from u.s. held baghdad airbase to u.s. held balad airbase, isn't it likely that there were also some u.s. troops, commanders, equipment, weapons or something like that on board ?

Originally posted by Souljah
I dont buy this official story.

Here is my previous post on this topic, when this plane was shot down.

which part of the official story u dont believe in?