(CNN) -- Rescuers were battling darkness to reach the crash site in eastern Afghanistan's Hindu Kush mountains, where a U.S. military helicopter carrying more than a dozen troops went down Tuesday.
The area west of Asadabad, near the Pakistan border, is known for having snow-covered peaks rising as high as 7,000 feet.
The doomed CH-47 Chinook, a twin-rotor transport, was carrying about 16 troops onboard, U.S. military officials said.
Military sources tell CNN an emergency beacon went off when the aircraft went down.
The mission was to bring in reinforcements "in support of U.S. forces currently conducting counter-terrorism operations," the Coalition Press Information Center of the Combined Forces Command in Kabul said in a written statement.
Army and Marine forces have been operating in the area, fighting insurgents believed to be crossing in and out of Pakistan.
Neither the cause of the crash nor the condition of those aboard were known late Tuesday. The military has not released any identities of the members onboard.
Source For Full Article : http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/asiapcf/06/28/afghan.crash/index.html
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