Jason Straziuso | Kabul | May 6

AP - A military transport helicopter with 10 U.S.-led coalition personnel aboard crashed while conducting combat operations in eastern Afghanistan, a U.S. military spokeswoman said Saturday. No information on the fate of those on board was immediately released.

The CH-47 Chinook crashed late Friday while on a mission in support of Operation Mountain Lion, an offensive to root out Taliban and al-Qaida militants near the mountainous border with Pakistan. The crash was not the result of hostile fire, Lt. Tamara D. Lawrence said.

The military would not immediately say whether there were any casualties, and did not give the names or nationalities of the 10 passengers and crew on board. Rescue and recovery operations began at daybreak Saturday, Lawrence said.

Update:
Reuters - A U.S. military helicopter crashed while on combat operations in eastern Afghanistan, killing all 10 people on board, the U.S. military said on Saturday.

The U.S. military said the crash was not a result of enemy fire although Taliban insurgents claimed they shot it down with a "new weapon."

ABC reporting all soldiers were American.

continuation of AP story:
The helicopter was conducting "operations on a mountaintop landing zone" when it crashed near Asadabad in Kunar province, about 150 miles east of Kabul, the capital, the military said.

Some 2,500 Afghan and U.S. soldiers are conducting the joint military operation in Kunar, one of the biggest since U.S.-led forces ousted the hardline Taliban regime in late 2001 for hosting al-Qaida.

Asadabad is surrounded by rugged mountains, and a large U.S. military base there houses hundreds of Marines and special forces commandos.

A military statement said other aircraft and crews near the landing zone during the crash confirmed hostile fire did not cause it. Lawrence said that although it was dark, the other coalition aircraft would have known if an enemy rocket had been fired.

Lawrence said the crash was being investigated and that little information was available.

"They're still doing rescue and recovery operations, so there's just a lot of unknown factors at this time," Lawrence said.

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