1994 British Army Lynx shootdown
| 1994 British Army Lynx shootdown | |
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| Part of the Troubles | |
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| Location | Crossmaglen, County Armagh, Northern Ireland |
| Coordinates | 54°4′33.5″N 6°36′32″W / 54.075972°N 6.60889°WCoordinates: 54°4′33.5″N 6°36′32″W / 54.075972°N 6.60889°W |
| Date | 20 March 1994 20:27 (GMT) |
| Target | British Army base |
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Attack type
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Mortar |
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Non-fatal injuries
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4 |
| Perpetrator | Provisional IRA |
On 20 March 1994, a British Army Lynx helicopter was shot down by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Northern Ireland. A unit of the IRA's South Armagh Brigade fired an improvised mortar at the British Army base in Crossmaglen, County Armagh. The mortar round hit and shot down the helicopter, serial number ZD275, while it was hovering over the helipad. Three British soldiers and a Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) member were wounded.
Since the 1970s, the IRA developed a series of home-made mortars. The goal was to produce devices to be use as "stand-off" weapons, capable of being launched from safe ranges upon police or military outposts, and easy to conceal on dead-ground. The different designs evolved in 1992 into the Mark 15 mortar, widely known as the "barrack buster". The mortar shell consisted of a one metre long metal propane cylinder with a diameter of 36 cm that contained around 70 kg of home-made explosives and with a range between 75 and 275 m. The cylinder was an adaptation of a commercial 'Kosangas' gas cylinder for heating and cooking gas used in rural areas in Ireland. The first use of the "barrack buster" took place on 7 December 1992 against a joint RUC/British Army base in Ballygawley, County Tyrone.
On the evening of 20 March 1994 a Lynx helicopter, serial number ZD275, was in the process of landing at the large British Army base at Crossmaglen. Meanwhile, an IRA unit had mounted a Mark 15 mortar on a tractor, concealed behind bales of hay. The tractor was parked 150 yards from the intended target, on waste ground. At 20:27, there was a sudden blackout across Crossmaglen's square and at the same time, a single mortar shell was lobbed into the barracks. The IRA had used the mains for the collapsing circuit of the firing pack, turning off the street's power supply and allowing the mortar's own battery to trigger the launcher. When the Lynx was hovering 100 feet over the helipad, the mortar round hit the aircraft on the tail's boom, which was severed from the fuselage. The machine spun out of control, but the pilot was able to crash-land the Lynx inside the base. A Grenadier Guards' patrol spotted a huge orange fireball from a mile away. Three members of the crew managed to get out with minor injuries, but a member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary was trapped inside the blazing wreckage. The constable was rescued just before the fuel tanks and the ammunition started to explode.
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