The US Army’s Apache helicopters are crashing at a historically high rate amid a widespread problem with the model’s transmission, according to a CNN analysis of military accident data.
The helicopter type has experienced five major crashes since October, and a deadly mishap earlier this month in Texas killed two soldiers, sparked a wildfire and led the Army to temporarily bar Apache pilots from conducting routine training flights. With that crash, fiscal year 2026 is on pace to be the second worst for Apache flight accidents since a new model of the AH-64 was rolled out in 2011.
The Army announced that the pause in training flights, which exempted units deployed to the Middle East, ended Wednesday.
Oh…
No…
I am SOOOOOO concerned…
Engineers are woke. We DOGEd em all because we care about your freedom
Did somebody stupid cut servicing checks, along with healthcare, environment and essential checks.
Don’t forget removal of oversight of QA, parts custody, etc.
Let’s not jump to obvious conclusions when Joe Biden is likely to blame.
What are you talking about, this was obviously Clintons fault
It’s peanuts! Oh, and talking about peanuts - it’s Carter’s fault.
Seems to be a batch of bad transmissions.
A lot of comments on here didn’t read the article and/or simply don’t know how aviation or military aviation works.
Some blaming the current administration even though the article notes a slightly higher accident rate in 2024. The current model Helicopter was fielded in 2011, and the article doesn’t mention when the transmission issues began.
This could be a maintenance problem, a Boeing problem. Is Boeing or an army subcontractor rebuilding the transmissions?
I just did inspections on some gearboxes because the incorrect self-locking nuts were used. I’ve seen a series of accidents caused by o-rings made out of spec internal to hydraulic servos. I remember NASA killing a crew due to o-ring issues. I remember a few decades ago Airbus had a series of helicopter accidents where the main rotors detached due to a gear in the main transmissions being hardened incorrectly. Before all that De Haviland Comets were coming apart in air due to metal fatigue.We should be concerned with the reaction to and correction of the issues. The Army has grounded training flights, which they should. Not long ago the V-22 fleet was grounded for like a year while clutch failures were investigated.
Just because YOU’VE only just heard of an issue doesn’t mean it hasn’t been a long standing issue nor that it’s the fault of whoever is in charge right now. We need more information before we start finger pointing.
Though Boeing has been on a downhill trend since the McDonald Douglas takeover.
Let me guess, AI decided to extend certain maintenance schedules and the wrenches who know better were ordered to go along with it.
Boeings doing what Boeings always do, nothing different about the Boeing.
That’s what happens when you put some dipshit who thinks militaries should be only “warriors” when all of history tells you successful militaries are logistics engines first and foremost
And worse, when professionalism is replaced with naked sycophancy and corruption.
Once upon a time I would find this sad because USA was an ally defending democracy and freedom, or at least so I thought.
But honestly today, I don’t give a shit.Fuck USA.
defending democracy and freedom
When exactly if I may ask
That’s the American propaganda. It’s so good most people actually believed the USA was a bastion of freedom and democracy. People are finally waking up. Hopefully they won’t just vote blue and pretend like the dems are totally about freedom and democracy.
I just watched a cute little YT video, Satan’s Guide to the Bible, that addressed the made up origin story of Israel (among other things) that is openly taught in credible Divinity Schools, that pastors just… ignore when preaching. And I get it, because the mobs would “leave not one alive.” But it is very sad how we cling so tightly to our myths without the ability to acknowledge that’s all they are, while allowing them to dictate ethos and government.
I’m not sure of any “made up origin of Israel”. King David did exist, and the time of most of old testament written.
What happened to Christianity after Rome sacked Jerusalem Church in 70AD was the eventual erasure of Jesus from Christianity. The early 2nd century gnostics argued that exodus 6:3 proved Yahweh was a demon instead of the fatherly figure of El that Jesus was recognizing. The entirety of monotheist Yahweh God stems from a song that King David’s musical director made up (psalm 82) where Yahweh kills all the other gods, but no one ever claimed to be a witness to the Astral plane’s process of that happening.
When the Gnostics believed in Jesus philophy over warmongering Moses primacy Torah version, that ignores all Jewish prophets condemning the fall of Israelite dominance as God abandoning pieces of shit genocidal evil rulers. Christianity would instead adopt the competing philosophy that every word in bible must be true, culminating in 4th Century roman papacy led by Constantine that declared Jesus and God are equal matter. This formally, forever after, cemented Christianity as being anti-Christ because the Roman empire (now officially Christian) that used the 70AD destruction of Church in the name of Jupiter as the new chosen people, now Christian, shifted to Yahweh viewing the Roman empire as the chosen people. All heretics and non Romans should now be genocided in the name of god, just as Moses said, and the parts of the bible where Israelites were mentioned were transformed them into proto-roman catholics. As late as 16th century, Saint Anne was invented as the Irish-Britany celtic goddess mother of Mary, somehow proto Roman/Catholic. Now you know, Jesus is a quarter-god Quebecois celtic.
- WW2
But to be fair, that is pretty much the only unambiguous example that comes to mind.
I’m afraid npt even that was the case
It is a totally ambiguous example. The US under Truman partnered with the Vatican to save almost 10k Nazis from trial and spread them all over the US sphere of influence with protection, money, jobs, property, etc. and then it immediately took over imperial Japan’s holding of Korea, established a fascist military dictatorship, and killed a million civilians in the North. Around the same time it protected the KMT in the province of Taiwan during the White Terror wherein the KMT established a fascist government that killed tens of thousands of civilians for political control.
It’s completely ambiguous whether or not the US was fighting for freedom or liberty.
Helicopters: “A collection of parts temporarily flying in formation”
The reason the Taliban didn’t bother trying to use US helicopters and other advanced equipment left in Afghanistan, was that the required maintenance wasn’t just expensive, it required a robust supply infrastructure.
The entire US military has massive supply issues, and the idiots running it will keep destroying very expensive equipment and risking the lives of service members because they’re not acknowledging the supply issues.
No one wants to put ten toes down and say “that can’t fly”.
Because all the high up officers who won’t just tell trump what he wants, resigned to protect their pensions.
They’re all cowards and this is on their hands as much as the yes men who stayed in.
I think Americans are starting to realize Trump see us as entirely disposable.
It’s not that, it’s the same shit as what happened to the Soviet military.
It’s nothing but grifters and yes men, so “on paper” doesn’t match reality.
Like inventory sheet says 100 helicopters that have been getting a million dollars of maintenance a month. But in reality you got 50 “good enough” and 50 that literally can’t fly. You can’t admit that, so the 50 do double duty flights, still not getting maintenance even tho the government is paying for all 100 to be serviced.
The “good enoughs” could be brought up to working order, but instead the problem is hid, and they crash totalling them out and people die. Everytime it happens, it increases the odds of happening again.
This isn’t just something that can be fixed on day 1. It’s a rot deep inside the military because everyone not doing it at a high level resigned.
Now we got to push everyone still in out, and replace them.
That takes decades at this level, because new officers need to raise their the ranks, and good people won’t join till the image recovers.
Whether it’s for better or worse we’ll have to wait and see, but the days of global American military precense won’t be back for 20 years at least.
but the days of global American military precense won’t be back for 20 years at least.
Skynet possibility aside, it seems impossible to regain dominance. When the Pentagon cannot make a good argument for rebuilding GCC bases, because of their obvious Iran capability to destroy them again a week later, they are further effectively admitting that the budget requests needed to overcome that incapacity can no longer be passed by congress.
100 helicopters that have been getting a million dollars of maintenance a month. But in reality you got 50 “good enough” and 50 that literally can’t fly.
This is a bigger, though newer, problem with F35. Lockheed clampdown on providing manuals to US army, and all service done through them, makes it an extremely expensive program. Low flight readiness ratio reflects the requirement to canibalize parts from some planes for the ones that fly. For decades, US weapons programs have been an oligarchy enrichment program to spend as much as possible, independent of security/capability enhancement.
Hopefully they’ll never return
Hell yeah.
Kakistocracy in action
More like kakastocracy, amirite?
Archive link with no persistent cookies
I bet they’re hiding losses to the enemy as malfunctions
