160th SOAR 101st Airborne Division Patch - Death Waits In The Dark

The Night Stalkers began as a provisional task force built in 1980 from 101st Airborne Division helicopter crews, including selected elements of the 158th Aviation Battalion, after Operation Eagle Claw failed in the Iranian desert. The unit was soon known as Task Force 160. It was formally established at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, on 16 October 1981 as the 160th Aviation Battalion. For a while its pilots still wore their 101st patches, and the original members call the separation from the division "the day the Eagles came off." That is the 101st connection in the name of this patch.

The battalion became the 160th Aviation Group (Airborne) in 1986 and the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), the 160th SOAR(A), in May 1990. Its crews flew in Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada in 1983, in Operation Prime Chance in the Persian Gulf in 1987 and 1988, in Operation Just Cause in Panama in 1989 and in Desert Storm in 1991. In October 1993 they were in the Battle of Mogadishu, and in 2011 they flew the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound. The fleet is built around MH-6M and AH-6M Little Birds, MH-60 Black Hawks including the armed DAP, and the MH-47 Chinook. Besides Fort Campbell, the regiment has units at Hunter Army Airfield, Georgia, and Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.

The patch is 3.5 inches wide and 4 inches tall, a round center with a scroll above and below, finished with a cut edge. "DEATH WAITS IN THE DARK" arcs across the top scroll in red on white, and "NIGHT STALKERS" fills the bottom scroll in the same red. On a blue field in front of a yellow moon, a hooded reaper with a raised blade rides a winged white horse. Rider and horse both have red starbursts for eyes, and six more red starbursts trail behind them across the night sky. It is a night raider in thread, and that is the whole idea of the unit.

The 160th was built for one job, flying special operations forces at night, low and on time, and it has done that job in nearly every major American operation since Grenada. Mogadishu in 1993 cost the regiment dearly, and the bin Laden raid eighteen years later showed how far its crews had taken the craft. The men and women who fly and fix those aircraft come from across Army aviation. The words on the top scroll are the warning an enemy gets after sundown. For the operators riding in back, they meant the opposite: the helicopters were coming.

It fits a shadow box with a 101st Airborne patch and a set of aviator wings, or a flight jacket worn to a regiment reunion. It is also a good gift for a pilot, crew chief or support soldier who served with the Night Stalkers. Measures 3.5 x 4 inches with a cut edge and iron-on backing, and it can also be sewn on.