Nine Polish soldiers were on board the helicopter when it was shot down Courtesy of WIkimedia Commons

Gazeta Wyborcza reports that on July 31 an Mi-24 helicopter gunship which was on route from Kabul to the Ghazni province in Afghanistan with nine soldiers on board caught fire.

"At around 5.30 pm flames started to come out of one of the engines. Then the second engine went off. The helicopter lost height. The lives of those on board were saved by the skills of the pilot," says the informer quoted by the daily.

While the crew survived, the zł.30 million helicopter is no longer in use. Military officials claim that they found bullet holes from a machine gun.

"The Taliban have such post soviet weapons. Their bullets hit hydraulics pipes. If the bullets had been one and a half meter further, there could have been a tragedy," said the officer.

Source: Gazeta Wyborcza