I don't know if it was shot down by the Taliban or if it crashed," said Marjah resident Haji Mohammad, who added he was about a kilometre away from the site when the helicopter came down.Īnother resident also said the helicopter had caught fire.Ī Taliban source claimed to AFP that the insurgents had shot the helicopter down, with all those on board killed. "The chopper fell to the ground and began to burn. Local residents told AFP that the helicopter caught fire. Initial reports were that a mortar had exploded near the helicopter. The second landed at the scene but its rotor blades were damaged after it apparently struck a wall, Cook said. One of these turned back after taking fire, and returned safely to its base. Two HH-60 Pave Hawk medical evacuation helicopters were scrambled after the attack. "This is an ongoing fight, and I think the events of the last few hours highlight that." "There are dangerous parts of Afghanistan where the fight is still under way, and Helmand province is one of those places," Cook said. The deployment, in addition to a recent arrival of US special forces in the region, comes a year after NATO forces formally ended their combat operations in the country. In December, the Taliban offensive prompted the first British deployment to the volatile province in 14 months. It was unclear if he meant Afghan wounded as well as the US soldiers.Īfghan forces are currently fighting to repel Taliban militants who in recent weeks have seized large swathes of the key opium-rich district of Sangin in the southern province of Helmand, a traditional stronghold of the insurgents. "We can confirm the wounded have been evacuated," Colonel Michael Lawhorn, a spokesman for NATO forces in Afghanistan, told AFP. An unspecified number of Afghan troops were also wounded in the mission, officials said.
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