US aviator shot down over Iran

A US Air Force weapons systems officer, identified only by the call sign 'Bravo,' gave his first public account in a CBS '60 Minutes' interview aired September 14 of surviving an April 2 shootdown over Iran, describing a terrifying free fall after his parachute failed to fully deploy: 'At one point when I looked up and saw no parachute, that was the most terrifying thing I've ever seen... I prayed, Lord, your will be done. But if I'm getting through this, I need help.' Bravo and pilot 'Alpha' were flying an F-15E Strike Eagle (call sign Dude 44), worth about $30 million, on a mission to strike facilities tied to Iran's drone and missile program near Isfahan when an Iranian shoulder-fired missile -- costing roughly $100,000 -- brought the jet down; US Central Command chief Adm. Brad Cooper said 'we had air superiority, but clearly we weren't flying over Kansas.' Bravo hit the ground at an estimated 70-100 mph, breaking his back, shoulder and arm, but still hiked to a ridgeline to evade Iranian forces before being rescued after roughly 48 hours behind enemy lines; Alpha, who declined to be interviewed, was rescued within six hours in an operation Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth described as 'a gun fight all the way in and all the way out.'

The rescue operation involved more than 90 US service members on the ground inside Iran at one point -- the first such US ground presence in the country in 46 years, according to Cooper -- and required destroying two additional US aircraft worth about $100 million each, plus several 'Little Bird' helicopters, after they became stuck in desert sand, to prevent their technology from falling into Iranian hands. The incident occurred roughly five weeks into the US-Israeli war against Iran, which by September had entered its seventh month and grown increasingly unpopular domestically amid rising energy prices, with President Trump predicting the previous week that the conflict would continue at least until the November 3 midterm elections.