Spc. Tryrail Fackrell, a Black Hawk helicopter crew chief out of Schofield Barracks, had experienced his share of "hot" landing zones in Iraq, but none like this.

It was a much different mission last month on Memorial Day: He had to find two fellow aviators from Hawai'i whose helicopter had been shot down.

Two U.S. Apache gunships looped overhead, firing 30 mm cannon rounds to prevent further enemy attack.

A Black Hawk loitered in the air as Fackrell's helicopter landed near a palm grove that evening and joined another chopper on the ground.

The Schofield Barracks OH-58D Kiowa, one of two flying low and fast, had been shot down by heavy machine-gun fire in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad, one of the most dangerous regions in Iraq.

It was a long couple of hundred yards through weeds and palms to get to the Kiowa, which had gone down in a farm field.

"I'm not quite sure how far it was to the crash site when we landed, but it felt like quite a distance," Fackrell, 22, said by phone from Iraq.

The Idaho man's heart and adrenaline were pumping.

"I was, 'Hey, this is the time to shine, go out, get our guys, bring them back.' Be a hero, kinda," he recalled.

Instead, he was greeted by tragedy.

The two pilots, 1st Lt. Keith Heidtman, 24, and Chief Warrant Officer Theodore "Tuc" Church, 32, were dead. Their aircraft hit the ground hard and was destroyed.

Fackrell and Spc. Michael Rowlette, who also is from Schofield, were among a group of soldiers who received Army Commendations with Valor for their role in the response to the attack, which would get even worse as the evening wore on.

Church had a daughter, Maryn, 6, and a son, Dorian, 4. Two days before he died, Church celebrated his 12th anniversary with his wife, Mindi, long-distance.

Heidtman's father, Kerry, had said, "If you had to pick your son, this is who you would pick."

A 'COMPLEX ATTACK'

The loss also highlighted a growing concern for the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade out of Schofield and its more than 100 helicopters in northern Iraq — the risk of ambush to aircraft and those sent to rescue them.

Speaking to reporters at the Pentagon two days after the attack, Army Brig. Gen. Perry Wiggins, deputy director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called the shoot-down a "complex attack."

A Bradley fighting vehicle that responded to the Kiowa crash was hit by a roadside bomb and five soldiers with the 1st Cavalry Division out of Fort Hood, Texas, were killed. Another 1st Cavalry soldier was killed by a second bomb. The unit never made it to the crash site.

Wiggins said at the time that the incident was under investigation, but that in the past, insurgents had "some pretty detailed tactics, techniques and procedures with regards to helicopters."

Since early August, the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade has lost four aircraft: two to enemy fire, one to mechanical problems and one due to the "environment," an official said.

Heidtman and Church are the only Schofield pilots who have been killed on this deployment to Iraq. Three other pilots killed were with the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade, but were out of Fort Bragg, N.C.

"There's risk every day out there. Aircraft in the brigade are engaged more than once a week from small-arms fire that could include machine guns of the type we think were used in this (the Kiowa) attack," said Maj. John Cyrulik, who's with an Apache battalion out of Fort Bragg that's attached to the Schofield aviation brigade.

Four other Hawai'i soldiers were killed in Iraq last week, meanwhile, including three on Thursday from a roadside bomb in Kirkuk province, and one on Wednesday in a noncombat incident.

Fackrell, the crew chief who with other soldiers made his way to the downed two-seat reconnaissance helicopter, said he usually flies several days a week out of Contingency Operating Base Speicher near Tikrit. But fortunately, none of the helicopters in his company has been hit by enemy fire.

"When we got to the (crash) site, it was definitely a shock," he said. "It was not what I was hoping for at all. It wasn't a sight that I wanted to see."

Rowlette, 26, a crew chief from Wisconsin, got out of the Black Hawk and was part of the security while helicopters were on the ground.

He said all the helicopter crews responded with the hopes that the two pilots were alive.

"It was a pretty big let-down to find out otherwise," Rowlette said. "I'm just glad we got them out of there."

With the heavily armed helicopters buzzing overhead, there were no insurgents shooting back, but Cyrulik said later that night enemy fighters were killed in the vicinity.

Muqdadiyah, where the attack occurred, is "a very contested area," Cyrulik said. "They had quickly engaged the aircraft and then dismantled their position ... and took those weapons probably into the village that was in the area."

SELFLESS ACTS

Cyrulik, flying in one of the Apaches, said one of "three or four completely selfless acts" he witnessed that evening was the second Schofield Kiowa circling and landing once the crash site had been found, and one of the pilots jumping out to check on the downed aviators.

The Kiowa pilots who were not hit, Jerry Brock and William Kilgore, both chief warrant officers with the 2nd Squadron, 6th Cavalry Regiment, are expected to be recognized separately for their actions.

Neither Fackrell nor Rowlette knew the downed pilots, but their deaths will be with them for a long time to come.

"I'm kind of glad that I didn't know them, because I don't know how I would have been able to handle something like that," Fackrell said.

"Anything like that is going to stay with you for a while," Rowlette said.

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com.