Kimberly's Flight

"e;The story of an outstanding young woman who realized her ambition to rise in military, fly helicopters and lead soldiers into combat."e; -Independent MailU.S. Army Captain Kimberly N. Hampton was living her dream: flying armed helicopters in combat and commanding D Troop, 1st Squadron, 17th Cavalry, the armed reconnaissance aviation squadron of the 82nd Airborne Division. An all-American girl from a small southern mill town, Kimberly was a top scholar, student body president, ROTC battalion commander, and highly ranked college tennis player. In 1998 she was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army. Then, driven by determination and ambition, Kimberly rapidly rose through the ranks in the almost all-male bastion of military aviation to command a combat aviation troop. On January 2, 2004, Captain Hampton was flying an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter above Fallujah, Iraq, in support of a raid on an illicit weapons marketplace, searching for an illusive sniper on the rooftops of the city. A little past noon her helicopter was wracked by an explosion. A heat-seeking surface-to-air missile had gone into the exhaust and knocked off the helicopter's tail boom. The helicopter crashed, killing Kimberly. Kimberly's Flight is the story of Captain Hampton's exemplary life. This story is told through nearly fifty interviews and her own e-mails to family and friends, and is entwined with Ann Hampton's narrative of loving and losing a child. "e;This inspiring story of self discipline, leadership, patriotism and sacrifice should be required reading for a country far removed from the concept of total war. Even the war's staunchest critics will enjoy this unromanticized picture of heroism."e; On Point: The Journal of Army History