Secret Stealth Helicopter Involved in Mission to Kill bin Laden?May 13, 2011

 

blackhawk

The U.S. Navy Seals who killed Osama bin Laden were highly trained in moving undetected behind enemy lines. But they may also have had a secret stealth weapon on their side.

Aviation analysts suggest that the assault team swept into bin Laden's compound in radar-evading helicopters that the Pentagon has never discussed openly, according to an article in The New York Times.

Experts would still not know of this stealth helicopter save for the fact that Special Forces commandos had to blow it up because one of the choppers may have been damaged on landing. Satellite and then news photos of the chopper's remains show features similar to the stealth features found on advanced fighter jets and bombers, the Times article noted.

The use of stealth helicopters might also explain how U.S. commandos were able to streak across Pakistan from Afghanistan without being detected by any Pakistani air defenses or radar.

The Pentagon will still not discuss the possibility of the existence of a stealth helicopter. And Leon E. Panetta, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, stated that two Black Hawk helicopters were used to shuttle in about 25 Navy SEALs.

But here is what aviation analysts have pieced together from the images of the debris, according to the Times:

  • The rear section does not look like the tail of a regular Black Hawk, the widely used helicopter built by Sikorsky.
  • The crashed aircraft looks more like a Black Hawk that has been modified to incorporate features of a proposed stealth chopper — the Comanche helicopter that the Pentagon cancelled in 2004. Some of the apparent modifications include an added a layer of special coating to the skin of the chopper to absorb radar signals and replacing the sharp edges of the helicopter with curved ones to better scatter the radar beams so that air defenses cannot piece together a realistic assessment of the aircraft.
  • The destroyed chopper also looks like it has five or six blades instead of the four found on the Black Hawks. Having extra blades would allow the helicopter to fly with a slower rotor speed to reduce the chop-chop sound associated with helicopters.
  • It also appeared to have a dishpan or hubcap over the rotor to also help reduce the chopper's radar signature.

(U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Samuel Morse)