Iraqi Insurgents Shoot Down Army Helicopter, Killing Two U.S. Pilots

Two U.S. pilots were killed Friday in northern Iraq when their helicopter was shot down by insurgents, the Army said. It was the second fatal helicopter crash involving American forces in less than a week and the 31st since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

The two-seat OH-58D Kiowa went down in Mosul while on combat patrol with another U.S. helicopter.

Hostile fire was reported in the area where the craft went down, the military said. Under cover provided by the other helicopter, ground units with the 172 Stryker Brigade Combat Team sealed off the area.

Associated Press quoted an officer with the brigade’s 2nd Battalion, 1st Infantry Regiment as saying that the gunmen fled into a nearby mosque and were not found.

The Army did not say whether anyone was detained.

The bodies of the two crew members were recovered, but their names were not released.

Eight U.S. troops and four American civilians died Jan. 7 when a Black Hawk helicopter crashed in bad weather near the city of Tall Afar, west of Mosul.

A Times analysis of data shows that before the Mosul incident, 138 U.S. service members had died in 30 helicopter crashes: 16 caused by hostile fire and 13 by accidents. The military has not determined the cause of the Black Hawk crash. In addition, 22 members of Britain’s armed forces have been killed in helicopter crashes.

The deadliest crash occurred last January when a sailor and 30 Marines, 27 of them based in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, were killed when a helicopter went down in a sandstorm in western Iraq. It was the biggest one-day loss of troops for Hawaii since the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Elsewhere Friday, two other incidents marred the lull in violence that had accompanied the four-day holiday of Eid al-Adha.

U.S. soldiers killed an Iraqi police officer shortly after he left the station in Duluiya, about 55 miles north of Baghdad, said Capt. Mahmoud Jibouri of the Duluiya police. The officer, still in uniform, was driving home when he was shot about 3 p.m., Jibouri said.

A spokesman for the Army said he had no information on the report.

Two Iraqi policemen were killed in Baqubah, 30 miles north of Baghdad, by a remotely detonated car bomb. The explosive, set off at a taxi stop, targeted a convoy, said 1st Lt. Mohammed Salman. Five other officers and a civilian were injured, and several cars destroyed.

Also on Friday, radical Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr met with officials in Saudi Arabia during the hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca.

Sadr, whose 2004 standoff with U.S. troops in Najaf threatened to spark a Shiite rebellion across Iraq, urged his followers to participate in the December parliamentary elections. Candidates allied with Sadr appear to have captured 30 of the 275 seats in the new National Assembly.

In a televised interview, Sadr said he was trying to enhance relations with Saudi Arabia, Iraq’s neighbor. Sadr also said he would consider meeting with Americans, but only after U.S. troops withdrew from Iraq.

“If they leave the Iraqi borders, and if we thought there would be a benefit, we would meet with them,” Sadr said.

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Times staff writer Saif Rasheed in Baghdad and special correspondents in Baqubah, Mosul and Taji contributed to this report.