On October 18, 2001, Operational Detachment Alpha (ODA) teams 555 and 595, both 12-man Green Beret teams from the 5th Special Forces Group, plus Air Force Combat Controllers, were airlifted by helicopter from the Karshi-Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan: more than across the Hindu Kush mountains in zero-visibility conditions by two MH-47E Chinook helicopters from 2nd Battalion 160th SOAR to the Dari-a-Souf Valley, just south of Mazar-e-Sharif. The Chinooks were refueled in-flight three times during the 11-hour mission, establishing a new world record for combat rotor-craft missions at the time. They linked up with the CIA and Northern Alliance. Within a few weeks the Northern Alliance, with assistance from the US ground and air forces, captured several key cities from the Taliban.