500 Pound Bomb Dropped on U.S. Soldiers By Mistake. (video)

[Belloc]

Thank Heaven no one was hurt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSzBCgbicbA#t=59

[ptmccain]

And that was "only" a 500 pounder, imagine what 2,000 pound bomb would have done.

[Watrdawg]

Seeing that hits close to home. My best friend was killed during Operation Anaconda in 02 by friendly fire from a C-130 gun ship. Those guys had a guardian angel watching over them that day.

[Big A]

Thank God none of those brave men were hurt.

I wouldn't want to be a pilot responsible for fratricide. That is a burden I don't think I would be able to live with.

[VooDoo6Actual]

Opps our bad. Regarding that CAS grid vector, I said NINER not Neener...

[rero360]

Who ever that JFO/ JTAC/ CCT or whoever was calling that in probably needs to go back to school, that or the pilot does. The JFO I replaced in Afghanistan almost had that happen to him twice with the same Apache pilot, twice the pilot read back his location as the target location and reported that he was coming in hot, after it was made clear that it was a dry run, weapons cold. Both times were training missions, not TICs. Because of that, I refused to run training missions with those pilots, just my luck I wouldn't have caught the mistake and end up getting myself and my team killed or some innocent civilians "In today's news, a National Guard soldier called in an airstrike on a girls school today in Afghanistan, more at 11"

[davidjinks]

I had a good friend killed in the Sinai because of a bad JTAC call. He was an EOD observer in a bunker with the JTAC and a couple other people. By the time the Hornet dropped its payload it was too late.

He was put on the EOD wall right before I graduated. Sad day. He was a survivor of a Blackhawk crash, the only one, during a training OP before he reclassed to EOD.

[HackerF15E]

Some of you might be surprised how often JTACs (and JFOs) call down the thunder on their own position.

Sometimes I've been read 9-lines with the same grid in both lines 6 and 8, and other times I've seen the grids for 6 and 8 swapped. Rarely, although I have seen it, line 6 is read as the friendly's actual grid and who knows what was in line 8.

Sometimes we in the pointy-nosed airplanes catch it on the initial read, sometimes on the readback, and sometimes it is our wingman or another asset in the stack who catches it...but it does happen with alarming frequency.

That being said, I also have two squadronmates who killed three friendlies, despite a good 9-line and a good readback, because the laser crosshairs in the airplane were dragged to a nearby, identical-looking building while the jet was maneuvering and neither one of them caught it.

There is plenty of human error to go around when it comes to fratricide in CAS.

All of that being said, never in the history of airpower was there a lower precentage of fratricide in CAS operations in a major combat action than in OEF and OIF.

[SteyrAUG]

Yeah...that was really, really, really close.

[J8127]

Some of you might be surprised how often JTACs (and JFOs) call down the thunder on their own position.

Sometimes I've been read 9-lines with the same grid in both lines 6 and 8, and other times I've seen the grids for 6 and 8 swapped. Rarely, although I have seen it, line 6 is read as the friendly's actual grid and who knows what was in line 8.

Sometimes we in the pointy-nosed airplanes catch it on the initial read, sometimes on the readback, and sometimes it is our wingman or another asset in the stack who catches it...but it does happen with alarming frequency.

That being said, I also have two squadronmates who killed three friendlies, despite a good 9-line and a good readback, because the laser crosshairs in the airplane were dragged to a nearby, identical-looking building while the jet was maneuvering and neither one of them caught it.

There is plenty of human error to go around when it comes to fratricide in CAS.

All of that being said, never in the history of airpower was there a lower precentage of fratricide in CAS operations in a major combat action than in OEF and OIF.

The fact that anyone passed you a grid in line 8 is the first problem.

This is an old video, this happened in 2012. CAS was being controlled by the company FSO at the cop who had taken sniper fire earlier and routinely blew the shit out of the surrounded ridge lines, with a JTAC in the BN TOC at a different fob not doing his job of double checking a non-JTACs work. The inability of the Joe on the ground to read a map, the JTAC's complacency and failure to actually plot the grid being passed, and the aircrew's perplexing inability to not notice the grid plotted on an incredibly obvious built up friendly OP created the perfect storm that leads to fratricide. Frat rarely happens because of a single mistake, it happens when everyone screws up.

The JTAC was decertified and sent home, I don't know what happened to the FSO but I understand it wasn't much.

[R0N]

All of that being said, never in the history of airpower was there a lower precentage of fratricide in CAS operations in a major combat action than in OEF and OIF.

Much of that has to do with in previous conflicts there was no real fires clearance process and because of the concerns with collateral effects we have used far less fires than in the past. Today one bone's worth of JDAMs is a lot of munitions, where in the past it would have been a whole division if not squadron of B52s

[HackerF15E]

The fact that anyone passed you a grid in line 8 is the first problem.

Been read a lot of 9-lines in my day, and the vast majority of them included the friendly location read in grid or lat/long. Some of them used direction and distance in addition to that grid, and some of them used direction and distance only (IAW JFIRE). We all know that what is done out in the field while iron is whizzing around doesn't always perfectly match doctrine.


the aircrew's perplexing inability to not notice the grid plotted on an incredibly obvious built up friendly OP

Do you have much experience employing ordnance from an aircraft? Wondering why you would find that mistake "perplexing", as visual ID of objects and locations on the ground -- especially from 3 or 4 miles away, with the workload of a single-seat cockpit -- is a skill that takes a lot of time and effort to develop. Having been tally target, visual friendlies prior to weapon release lots and lots of times personally, I can tell you from my perspective the two positions often look alike from where I sit. Things that look "obvious" from ground level and zero knots airspeed don't look that way from a fast moving airplane at 15,000 feet. Even something very "obvious" like a smoke pop or several VS-17 panels can look like nothing while pointing at the ground doing 400 knots and looking down a pipper in the HUD.

[J8127]

I'm a JTAC-I/SEE. I've deployed four times to Iraq and Afghanistan. I have never seen anyone read a grid for line 8, and if I did I would fail them for it. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, I remember a CRF about it, but I don't believe you that the vast majority of 9-lines you have been read included a friendly grid, unless you are taking information passed during an AO update as Line 8.

These guys were not in a firefight, there was plenty of time for everyone involved to check what they were doing. Like I said, everyone involved screwed up, the JTAC at a different fob was decertified for not checking the grids, but don't pretend like pilots are too busy wheeled up overhead in a no threat environment to notice the grid plotted on top of a ****ing fob.

[HackerF15E]

I'm a JTAC-I/SEE. I've deployed four times to Iraq and Afghanistan. I have never seen anyone read a grid for line 8, and if I did I would fail them for it. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, I remember a CRF about it, but I don't believe you that the vast majority of 9-lines you have been read included a friendly grid, unless you are taking information passed during an AO update as Line 8.

Well, since we're dick-measuring, I'm a 18-year F-15E pilot with four trips to Iraq and Afghanistan between 2001 and 2012, too, with over 300 combat missions as well as being a CAS-qualified instructor -- I've been read my share of 9-lines from a good number and wide variety of JTACs and dropped/shot my share of ordnance from those 9-lines.

No, I'm not counting fac-to-fighter updates...I'm talking the actual 9-line read. This is working with everyone from green Army Joes, to high speed CJSOTF types, Marines, and coalition/allies of many colors. It happens more than just rarely. Even if you haven't seen it. Not discounting your experience or expertise, but I have experienced what I've experienced.

When I say I've seen near-frats because I've seen the friendly position read as grid in line 6 and the target position read as grid in line 8 (and the other variations previously mentioned), I'm not mentioning it as an example of the correct way to pass a 9-line. I am identifying that it is an ERROR, not in accordance with 3-09.3/JFIRE, and a root cause of friendly deaths (and near deaths) that I've personally seen.


don't pretend like pilots are too busy wheeled up overhead in a no threat environment to notice the grid plotted on top of a ****ing fob.

Nothing to do with "too busy"; everything to do with the fact that things look differently from the air than they do on the ground. This is why they train guys like you specially to be able to provide a talk-on that looks familiar to someone at altitude rather than at ground level. In addition, the task load means that, with attention divided between several acute tasks (like flying), it is a lot easier than you might think to not be able to clearly identify something that looks dog-balls easy from where you sit on the ground.

If you haven't had to do it, then you probably can't understand it. Just in the same way you can't have a non-JTAC truly appreciate the challenge in managing a CAS stack and controlling kinetic fires, no matter how much you try and explain it.

[Arctic1]

Was this a Type 2 (remote) Control in the video?

What deconflicting measures are there to avoid this type of incident during talk on? Relying solely on a grid seems a bit lacking in redundancy, if it was a type 2 remote.

My main experience and training with this is ECAS, and that is different.

Is there no terrain orientation, no dry run, no "confirming visual on target"?

In any case the JTAC clears the aircraft hot, so he bears ultimate responsibility for a misdrop (barring specific ROE release which does not need to be discussed here).

[J8127]

I could write a book answering your questions and still only cover half of it. It wasn't a JTAC on the net doing the control, the lack of involvement and cross-checking by the JTAC was his error in the whole thing and why he was decertified, but it was an Army Co FSO doing the work. I couldn't tell you what techniques were or were not used, and like anything else even the ones you suggested are all situational dependent.