A promotional image of the "Operation Geronimo" stealth helicopter model kit from Dragon Models Limited. (DragonModelsUSA.com)
A popular Chinese toy company is taking the secret weapon in the deadly U.S. raid on Usama bin Laden's Pakistan compound and turning it into kid's play – offering a “Operation Geronimo” stealth helicopter scale model kit that come in pairs of two, just like in the real-life events.
“The fuselage, nose and tail were all modified to reduce the craft’s radar cross-section,” reads a product description on DragonModelsUSA.com, the U.S. distributor of Dragon Models Limited. “This 1+1 package will even allow modelers to recreate the raid on Bin Laden’s hideout!”
When Navy SEAL Team Six dropped into Bin Laden’s Pakistan compound last month, killing the Al Qaeda leader, one of two top secret stealth helicopters used in the mission had to make an emergency crash landing.
The U.S. operatives used explosives to destroy what was left of the damaged aircraft, which experts believe is a modified Black Hawk, to prevent it from falling into foreign hands. But the explosion was not enough to cover up all of its wreckage, leaving behind a tail that generated speculation over the helicopter’s actual design.
“Were it not for the fact that one of them crash-landed and had to be destroyed, the world would probably not have realized that the U.S. possesses such stealthy helicopter variants," the product description read.
Dale Bruner, president of online hobby shop InternetHobbies.com, said his store is “excited” to carry the model kit, which is to come stateside in July.
“It’s one of the first times anyone has come out with something like this,” he said.
Bruner believes China’s advanced plastics manufacturing technologies allowed Dragon to create a model of the helicopter so quickly.
The Dragon design team in Hong Kong could not be reached for comment.
But Bruner offered another take on the how the company may have stumbled upon the helicopter's toy-worthy, top-secret design.
“When the tail was in Pakistan, the first people sent to view it weren’t the Chinese government, but the people from Dragon models,” he joked.
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