Notable Events & Controversies
On March 31, 2004, Iraqi insurgents in Fallujah attacked a convoy containing four American private military contractors from Blackwater USA who were conducting delivery for food caterers ESS. The four armed contractors Scott Helvenston, Jerko Zovko, Wesley Batalona and Michael Teague, were attacked and killed with grenades and small arms fire. Their bodies were hung from a bridge crossing the Euphrates. This event was one of the causes of the US military attack on the city in the First Battle of Fallujah. In the fall of 2007, a congressional report by the House Oversight Committee found that Blackwater intentionally "delayed and impeded" investigations into the contractors' deaths. The report also acknowledges that members of the now-defunct Iraqi Civil Defense Corps "led the team into the ambush, facilitated blocking positions to prevent the team's escape, and then disappeared
In April 2004, a small team of Blackwater employees, along with a fire team of U.S. Marines, held off over 400 insurgents outside the Coalition Provisional Authority headquarters in Al Najaf, Iraq, waiting for U.S. troops to arrive. The headquarters was surrounded and it was the last area in the city that remained in coalition control. During the siege, as supplies and ammunition ran low, a team of Blackwater contractors 70 miles (113 km) away flew to the compound to resupply and bring an injured U.S. Marine back to safety outside of the city. In April 2005 six Blackwater independent contractors were killed in Iraq when their Mi-8 helicopter was shot down. Also killed were three Bulgarian crewmembers and two Fijian gunners. Initial reports indicate the helicopter was shot down by rocket propelled grenades. In 2006 a car accident occurred in the Baghdad Green Zone when an SUV driven by Blackwater operatives crashed into a U.S. Army Humvee. Blackwater guards disarmed the Army soldiers and forced them to lie on the ground at gunpoint until they could disentangle their SUV from the wreck.
Five Blackwater contractors were killed on January 23, 2007 in Iraq when their Hughes H-6 helicopter was shot down. The incident happened on Baghdad's Haifa Street. The crash site was secured by a personal security detail, callsign "Jester" from 1/26 Infantry, 1st Infantry Division. A U.S. defense official has confirmed that four of the five killed were shot execution style in the back of the head, but did not know whether the four had survived the crash. In late May 2007, Blackwater contractors opened fire on the streets of Baghdad twice in two days. The first incident occurred when a Blackwater-protected convoy was ambushed in downtown Baghdad. The following incident occurred when an Iraqi vehicle drove too close to a convoy. However, according to incident testimony, the Blackwater guards tried to wave off the driver, shouted, fired a warning shot into the car's radiator, finally shooting into the car's windshield. On May 30, 2007, Blackwater employees shot an Iraqi civilian deemed to have been "driving too close" to a State Department convoy being escorted by Blackwater contractors. Other private security contractors, such as Aegis Defence Services have also been accused of similar actions.
On September 16, 2007, Blackwater guards opened fire in Nisour Square, Baghdad in defense of a convoy transporting US State Department workers. The incident, known as the Blackwater Baghdad shootings, resulted in the deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians. Some witnesses claimed that the attack was unprovoked and that the soldiers, in the employ of the U.S., continued firing while the Iraqi civilians were fleeing. However, Blackwater maintained that its guards were under attack and responded accordingly. The FBI initially found that at least 14 of the shootings were unjustified and found no evidence to support assertions by Blackwater employees that they were fired upon by Iraqi civilians. However, in 2009 FBI investigators were unable to match the bullets from the shooting to those guns carried by Blackwater contractors, leaving open the possibility that insurgents also fired at the victims. CEO Erik Prince testified before the United States Congress on October 2, 2007 that no one guarded by Blackwater in Iraq has ever suffered a fatality or serious injury.
On October 3, 2007 Blackwater contractors rescued the Polish Ambassador to Iraq, Gen. Edward Pietrzyk, after an assassination attempt, using a Little Bird helicopter.
In early January 2008, Blackwater evacuated three American missionaries in Kenya using a 10 passenger single engine aircraft, picking them up at an airstrip near the village of Kimilili.
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Famous quotes containing the words notable and/or events:
“Every notable advance in technique or organization has to be paid for, and in most cases the debit is more or less equivalent to the credit. Except of course when it’s more than equivalent, as it has been with universal education, for example, or wireless, or these damned aeroplanes. In which case, of course, your progress is a step backwards and downwards.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“There are no little events in life, those we think of no consequence may be full of fate, and it is at our own risk if we neglect the acquaintances and opportunities that seem to be casually offered, and of small importance.”
—Amelia E. Barr (1831–1919)