'Black Hawk Down' veteran from Durand dies at age 64

ROCKFORD — Delta Force sniper Sgt. First Class James P. McMahon’s face was so badly battered and cut, “he looked like he was wearing a fright mask” as he stood atop a downed Black Hawk helicopter and pulled free the body of a fellow soldier from the wreckage.

That’s the first description of McMahon in the book by journalist Mark Bowden called “Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War.” It is a detailed account of the horrific Battle of the Black Sea fought in the streets of Mogadishu, Somalia, in October 1993. It claimed the lives of 18 elite American soldiers.

Among the survivors was McMahon, a 1972 Durand High School graduate who served in the U.S. Army for nearly three decades.

Friends and family along with fellow soldiers and veterans on Saturday will lay McMahon to rest at St. Mary Catholic Cemetery in Durand. He died Nov. 5 at age 64, according to his obituary, which did not reference a cause of death.

A McCorkle Funeral Home director said family members did not wish to comment.

The obituary says that McMahon served 16 years in the U.S. Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment and then later as a member of the elite Delta Force. He retired in 2002 with the rank of sergeant-major. He went on to work as a defense contractor overseas and in the United States. And since 2013, worked as a special operations instructor at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

https://www.rrstar.com/news/20191115/black-hawk-down-veteran-from-durand-dies-at-age-64