THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 14, 1994 TAG: 9407140690
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A01 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ART PINE, LOS ANGELES TIMES
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
The Pentagon said Wednesday the downing of two Army helicopters by U.S. fighters over Iraq in April was caused by a wide range of avoidable human errors, and it announced a sweeping overhaul of flight procedures worldwide to prevent further accidents.
Calling the incident ``a tragedy that never should have happened,'' Defense Secretary William J. Perry approved recommendations that a general and another officer be relieved of their duties, and told top commanders to decide whether others should face punitive action.
He also ordered a major shuffling of the operations of Air Force AWACS early-warning radar planes, which an investigative report Wednesday blamed as a major factor in the accident, which killed 26 people.
The 21-volume report was the result of thousands of hours of analysis and interviews with more than 130 witnesses, including the pilots of the two F-15C fighters who fired the missiles that downed the two helicopters.
Gen. John M. Shalikashvili, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference that the investigation showed ``there were a shocking number of instances in which individuals failed to do their jobs properly.''
The general relieved of hisduties was Air Force Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Scott Pilkington, who had been co-commander, along with a Turkish officer, of the U.S.-led operation to enforce the no-fly zone in northern Iraq.
Pentagon officials said the ``senior missions supervisor'' for the AWACS operation also was relieved of his duties, but they declined to make his name public, pending further investigation. There was no indication whether he might be disciplined in the case.
Much of what was contained in Wednesday's report by the board of inquiry already had been disclosed.
The document showed, for example, that the lead F-15C pilot mistook the two U.S. helicopters for Iraqi planes, and that his wingman, who was piloting the second fighter, did not try to prevent the shooting even though he could not confirm the identification.
The report also confirmed earlier speculation that the transponders carried by the two helicopters to identify them as American did not transmit the proper coded signals - though it said investigators have been unable to determine why the devices apparently malfunctioned.
But the investigators meted out the lion's share of the blame for the tragedy to the crew of the AWACS radar plane, which it said failed to warn the F-15Cs and the Black Hawks of each others' presence, even though it had both aircraft on its radar screens.
And it cited ``a breakdown in command guidance and supervision'' throughout the entire no-fly zone enforcement operation in northern Iraq, from a failure to integrate fighter and helicopter activities to a laxity in updating rules by which the F-15C fighters may fire.
The document said the AWACS crew believed it was not responsible for monitoring copter flights or for coordinating them with fighter operations and did not take a series of routine steps that could have prevented the tragedy.
And it said the mission crew commander of the AWACS squadron, who had flown only one sortie in the three previous months, ``was not currently qualified in accordance with Air Force regulations.''
Perry said Wednesday the Pentagon already has changed flight procedures to help prevent such incidents in the future - including consolidating air-control for helicopter and fighter flights and tightening the conditions under which a U.S. jet can fire upon another plane.
But he also made clear that he had become very much displeased with the way the Air Force was operating its fleet of AWACS planes, which until now had been regarded as elite units that were largely free of external criticism.
He ordered a major overhaul of procedures and training for AWACS crews throughout the Air Force, particularly for joint operations involving the Air Force and other services. Such operations have become more common.
And he directed the Pentagon's four-service ``joint staff'' to develop new guidelines for interservice operations worldwide that take account of lessons the military learned from the April 14 incident. ILLUSTRATION: Color map
Haiti
For copy of map, see microfilm
WHY U.S. SHOT DOWN ITS OWN HELICOPTERS
Causes cited Wednesday by the Pentagon for the downing of two Army
helicopters on April 14, which resulted in 26 deaths:
1. Two Air Force F-15C jet pilots, enforcing an allied ban on
flights over northern Iraq, mistook two Army Black Hawk helicopters
for the Russian-made Hind helicopters flown by the Iraqis.
2. Some crew aboard an AWACS monitoring plane knew the
helicopters were friendly, but a communications breakdown prevented
them from notifying the jet pilots.
3. Helicopter pilots used the wrong frequency to send a radio
signal identifying themselves as friendly to the jet pilots.
KEYWORDS: PENTAGON IRAQ U.S. ARMY
by CNB