This is what a downed pilot does to survive

TT

Published 22.56

          

        

 The US Air Force has special units for search and rescue operations on enemy territory. Archive                 photo. Photo: Brennan Linsley/AP/TT

A feverish hunt is underway for an American fighter pilot who ejected from his plane over Iran.

The pilots are trained in survival, but the US has carried out few rescue operations of the type that are now underway in recent decades.

It was last Friday that an American F-15E was shot down over western Iran. Both crew members ejected, according to the US military, but only one has been rescued.

The fate of the other pilot is unknown. Regardless, a search operation is underway.

American pilots are trained in survival techniques. Its application begins immediately after launch, says former fighter pilot Houston Cantwell.

“Your best overview of where you want to go, or which places you want to avoid, is when you are on your way down in the parachute,” he tells Newsweek.

The first challenge is to land safely. Broken bones are not uncommon, according to Cantwell.

Hiding

Once on the ground, the next task is to find a safe place – preferably far from the local population – to avoid being captured by the enemy, and from there share your location through transmitters included in the equipment, says Admiral William J. Fallon to The New York Times. He is the former head of the US military command Centcom.

Then it is time to try to wait for help. The US Air Force has special forces ready in the vicinity for this type of search and rescue operations in enemy territory, known as CSAR.

In videos verified by the BBC, US helicopters have been seen flying at low altitude in western Iran.

A former commander of such a unit tells the American television channel CBS that a rescue operation like the one in Iran should involve at least 24 such specially trained soldiers searching the area in Blackhawk helicopters.

“Extremely dangerous”

He describes such missions as “terrifying and extremely dangerous, to put it mildly”.

But Iran is also searching for the pilot. According to Iranian state media, a reward of the equivalent of half a million kronor has been issued for anyone who finds the US soldiers.

A captured US soldier would have been a “very powerful bargaining chip” for the regime, Laurel Rapp of the Chatham House think tank told the BBC.

During the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, thousands of CSAR missions were carried out, but since then they have been rare, according to the BBC.

One of the more famous cases took place in 1995 during the Bosnian War, when American pilot Scott O'Grady was rescued by special forces after evading capture for six days.