FALLUJAH, Iraq - A Black Hawk medivac helicopter, clearly marked with a red cross, crashed yesterday after a witness said it was hit by a rocket, killing all nine U.S. soldiers aboard. In Baghdad, a C-5 transport plane with 63 passengers and crew limped safely back to the airport after being struck by fire from insurgents.
About 80 Iraqi prisoners, meanwhile, were released from Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison, but they were not the detainees that U.S. authorities had promised would be freed under a special amnesty.
The military said a U.S. soldier died Wednesday of injuries suffered in a mortar attack that wounded 30 other troops and a civilian west of Baghdad.
The deaths brought to at least 495 the number of Americans killed in Iraq from hostile and nonhostile causes since the start of the war in March, according to the U.S. Central Command and the Department of Defense.
The Black Hawk went down about four miles south of Fallujah, a stronghold of the anti-U.S. insurgency, the 82nd Airborne Division said.
The military said the cause of the crash was not known, but a witness, Mohammed Ahmed al-Jamali, said he heard the distinctive whoosh of a rocket and saw the helicopter, which was clearly marked with red crosses signifying its medical mission, struck in the tail.
The 27-year-old farmer, who lives close to the crash site, said he rushed to the scene but found everyone dead.
The helicopter was a medical evacuation aircraft, but it was unclear if it was carrying patients, a military official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Another witness, student Waleed Kurdi, 23, said he heard a loud explosion and I saw the fire in the air as the chopper exploded in two before it hit the ground.
Twice before, U.S. helicopters have gone down near Fallujah, a city 35 miles west of Baghdad.
A OH-58 Kiowa observation helicopter went down Jan. 2, killing one soldier. Military officials said it almost certainly was shot down. And on Nov. 2, a Chinook helicopter was shot down near the city, killing 16 American soldiers and injuring 26. The military believes a SA-7 shoulder-fired missile hit one of the chopper's rear-mounted engines.
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Iraqi prisoners wave from the back of a U.S. military truck as they are being released outside Baghdad's Abu Ghraib Thursday Jan. 8, 2004. Hundreds of angry Iraqis gathered outside Baghdad's infamous Abu Ghraib prison, waiting for a release of detainees t
