Use of armed medevac choppers debated

BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan -- It took a medevac unit 59 minutes to get Army Spc. Chazray Clark to a hospital in southern Afghanistan after receiving a call that a roadside bombing severed three of his limbs. Clark did not survive.

But the rescue aircraft was unarmed, as are all Army medevacs. The pre-dawn pickup zone in Kandahar province was considered "hot," or dangerous, meaning the medevac could not swoop in for the pickup until another chopper with firepower arrived to provide cover.

In Clark's case, the military said there was a delay in determining whether any armed escort helicopters already in the air could be diverted to the scene. It's unclear how long that lasted and whether it made a difference. Army officials said they could not disclose the time Clark, 24, a combat engineer from Detroit, died because of a policy not to reveal medical information about casualties.

About 20 U.S. lawmakers have written to military officials inquiring about the Sept. 18 incident, which has revived a debate over whether Army medevac helicopters should have their own guns.

Clark's mother, some medevac pilots and others who want to see the medevacs armed note that helicopters fly in pairs in Afghanistan. If both are armed, escorts wouldn't be needed, and both could evacuate patients from the battlefield. That amounts to greater capacity, not less, they say, and there would be no waiting for escorts.

Army officials say waiting for an escort is rare, and that installing machine guns, ammunition and soldiers to man them would add roughly 600 pounds to a medevac chopper. That extra weight would limit its ability to fly in some high-altitude areas and reduce the number of patients who could be evacuated at a time.

The Army's goal is to get the most critically injured troops, or Category A patients, to a medical facility within 60 minutes after someone on the battlefield calls for the rescue. Clark reached the hospital one minute within the goal. The Army boasts that a service member wounded in Afghanistan has a 92 percent chance of surviving, the best of any war.