Winchester Over the Hammurabi

In early April 2003 A-10 pilots, from the 110th Fighter Wing, from the Battle Creek Air National Guard Base Michigan,  were clearing a path for ground troops on their way to Baghdad. Standing in their way was the Hammurabi Division one of the Iraqi Army’s most elite units and thus, an important target to be neutralized.

On the night of the attack against the Hammurabi the A-10’s were cleared to a designated grid of over a mile long and 3/4 of a mile wide. Below lay a series of ammo storage buildings, tanks, trucks, anti-aircraft artillery sites and other ground assets belonging to the Iraqi’s.

The night weather was a low thin overcast with moonlight filtering through. Although they started the strike wearing Night Vision Goggles the brilliant light from the secondary explosions and fires became so intense they had to remove their NVG’s and flew by the ambient light from the fires below. Major Jim “Chocks” Ewald was the flight leader and in his words, “There was extensive atmospherics due to the moonlight scattering throughout a thin cloud layer combined with the illumination from below. The aircraft cast these huge, eerie shadows of itself on the clouds above and it looked like a giant hawk circling and maneuvering.”

Even though many of the attack runs bottomed out at 1,500 feet, smoke plumes from the fires rose as high as 11,000 feet. The jets had to fly around the towers of smoke as they navigated and positioned themselves for further attacks above the inferno below.

This scene shows Chocks just after expending the last of his ammo, which included rockets, Maverick missiles, MK-82 bombs and 30MM cannon rounds. When they ran out of ammo the radio call was “Winchester” Shortly after, Chocks and his Wingman left the airspace, other jets came in to continue to hammer the Iraqi’s.

“Winchester over the Hammurabi” is available as both a signed, Limited Edition print on archival paper and as a larger sized, signed Artist Masterwork on canvas.