First woman pilot killed in Iraq
Helicopter pilot Capt. Kimberly Hampton of Easley was killed in Iraq Friday, making her the first female pilot casualty.
Saturday, her parents wrapped themselves in the memories of her warmth and smile, and her patriotic leanings.
"She believed in what she was doing over there," said her dad, Dale Hampton. "She was a commander of helicopters over there."
He said Hampton wrote of her desire to fly when she was in third grade.
A 1994 graduate of Easley High School, Hampton was deployed Aug. 31, her father said.
Hampton said he hoped his daughter's death would "get some people to pay attention to what's going on over there."
Hampton, 27, is also believed to be the first woman from South Carolina killed in combat in Iraq, according The Associated Press. She was flying an OH-58 Kiowa helicopter when it was attacked by enemy fire, military and The AP reports said. Another helicopter pilot was injured in the incident, which occurred in Fallujah, west of Baghdad, The AP reported.
According to the Los Angeles Times, American troops sealed off the site of Friday's crash, a dusty plantation near the Euphrates River, then swarmed over the area, carrying out house-to-house searches and blocking off streets as assault helicopters circled overhead.
Fallujuh, a conservative, tribal-dominated community about 35 miles west of Baghdad, has been a focal point of the anti-American insurgency, which continues to simmer despite the Dec. 13 capture of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
Witnesses said they saw a projectile strike the helicopter about 1 p.m. before the aircraft spiraled toward the ground.
"We saw a missile hit it, and we could see that the soldiers inside were trapped," Hussein Dari, a 25-year-old laborer in Fallujah, told the Times. "It was burning, and smoke was coming from it."
U.S. military officials said later that, based on reports from the field, they believed ground fire had downed the OH-58 Kiowa Warrior.
"They are fairly convinced that it was enemy fire," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt told reporters in Baghdad, the capital.
Kimmitt said that after the helicopter crash-landed, paratroopers guarding the site encountered assailants wearing black vests emblazoned with the word "Press." He said four assailants were captured after a car chase.
Several local Iraqi journalists who approached the crash site said subsequently they, too, were picked up for questioning by the Americans.
Hampton was with the 82nd Airborne Division in Iraq and had been stationed at Fort Bragg, N.C.
She was an honor graduate of the U.S. Army Helicopter Flight School and Officers Basic Course at Fort Rucker, Ala., according to Presbyterian College, where she was a 1998 honors graduate and tennis champion.
Hampton also served tours in South Korea, where she patrolled the no-fly zone and did another stint during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, according to her father.
Her mother, Ann, looked at photos of the couple's only child with a warm smile.
"I call it her million-dollar smile," she said. "That's what we'll miss most around here."
Her father said his daughter was unmarried, but a male friend, also a helicopter pilot serving in Baghdad, has been given temporary leave and is coming to Easley.
In college, she finished her singles tennis career with a 27-0 record in the South Atlantic Conference, winning singles titles in 1997 and 1998, according to the college and her mother. She was ranked 18th nationally in doubles play, the school said.
"Kim was one of those students who could be found excelling in the classroom, competing on a tennis court, leading ROTC drills, working in the community, or meeting with friends," the college Web site said. "She was truly a renaissance woman."
The school said it observed a moment of silence in her memory during a men's basketball game Saturday.
Ken Porter, a co-worker of her father, said her family is doing as well as expected after news of the death.
"She was flying protection," he said. "It's a tragedy. It's just a shock."
"She was just an all-around good person and an all-American woman," Porter said Saturday.
Porter said Hampton told him she took pride in defending the United States.
"She felt like she was doing her part to fight terrorism," he said.
The college had this to say:
"Kim will be remembered as one of PC's finest student-athletes," according to Al Ansley, a sports information spokesman at Presbyterian College. "It would be difficult to find someone who was able to balance so many activities while excelling at so many of them."
Her funeral is tentatively scheduled for Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on when her body arrives at Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport, her father said.