Two dead after military helicopter crashes in Texas

An AH-64 Apache attack helicopter based at Fort Hood, Texas crashed into a field near Salado on August 13, 2026, killing both crew members aboard -- Chief Warrant Officer 2 Deontre Huey, 34, and Warrant Officer Seth Olmstead, 25, of the 1st Cavalry Division's 1st Battalion, 227th Aviation Regiment -- and sparking an out-of-control wildfire that burned about 100 acres and forced evacuations. Officials called it a "violent crash"; the helicopter hit no structures or people, and the cause remained under investigation by the Army Combat Readiness Center. Two days later, the Army temporarily grounded all Apache training flights fleet-wide pending a better understanding of the crash's root cause, restoring them by August 20.

A CNN analysis published August 25 found Army Apache helicopters were crashing at a historically elevated rate -- five major ("Class A") crashes in fiscal year 2026 alone, the second-worst year since the current AH-64E model was introduced in 2011 -- and tied the trend to a widespread, still-under-investigation transmission defect that can knock out an Apache's tail rotor, electrical power and hydraulics; internal Army safety messages had already identified roughly 80 potentially faulty transmissions across the fleet and ordered them grounded pending repair, with Boeing (the aircraft's manufacturer) assisting the Army's inspection and repair effort. An Army spokesperson said just over half of this year's Apache incidents were attributed to human error but would not say how many of the more severe crashes, including the fatal Fort Hood accident, were linked to the transmission problem specifically.