Badly wounded U.S. Air Force officer climbed 7,000 foot Iranian ridgeline to hide after being shot down

Updated on: September 13, 2026 / 8:06 PM EDT / CBS News

When an American fighter jet was shot down over Iran this past April 2, not one, but two U.S. Air Force officers were left stranded, alone in a rugged mountain range, being pursued by Iranian forces. To prevent their capture — five weeks into a costly and unpopular war that has taken the lives of 18 U.S. service members — the U.S. military launched one of the largest search and rescue operations in its history.

Tonight, we begin our 59th season with how the mission unfolded. We'll show you newly declassified footage and you'll meet the colonel who lived through it all to tell us the story.

When the U.S. went to war with Iran this past February, it was by sea but mostly from the air.

ADM. BRAD COOPER: Broadly, we had flown about 13,000 missions up to this point. So we had air superiority, but clearly we weren't flying over Kansas.

Adm. Brad Cooper is the American commander in charge of the war. We asked him what brought the fighter jet to a mountainous area south of the city of Isfahan, close to where Iran had…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/entertainment/