The Daande Darpkhel airstrike took place on the morning of 8 September 2008 when a United States Air Force

United States Air Force

The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

 drone aircraft

Unmanned aerial vehicle

An unmanned aerial vehicle , also known as a unmanned aircraft system , remotely piloted aircraft or unmanned aircraft, is a machine which functions either by the remote control of a navigator or pilot or autonomously, that is, as a self-directing entity...

 fired a number of missiles at a former madrassa (religious school) complex located in the village of Daande Darpkhel, near the main town Miranshah

Miranshah

Miranshah is the capital or headquarters of North Waziristan in Pakistan. It is the site of a town, which has s small airfield that was built by the British for World War II. The area in which Miranshah sits is extremely dangerous mainly due to Taliban activities and U.S. Drone...

, North Waziristan

North Waziristan

North Waziristan is the northern part of Waziristan, a mountainous region of northwest Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan and covering . Waziristan comprises the area west and south-west of Peshawar between the Tochi river to the north and the Gomal river to the south, forming part of Pakistan's...

, Pakistan. It was part of a series of drone attacks

Drone attacks on Pakistan by the United States of America

The United States government, led by the Central Intelligence Agency's Special Activities Division, has made a series of attacks on targets in northwest Pakistan since 2004 using drones . These attacks are part of the US' War on Terrorism campaign, seeking to defeat Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants...

 targeting presumed militants, which took advantage of the power vacuum in Pakistan, following the fall of Pervez Musharraf

Pervez Musharraf

Pervez Musharraf , is a retired four-star general who served as the 13th Chief of Army Staff and tenth President of Pakistan as well as tenth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee. Musharraf headed and led an administrative military government from October 1999 till August 2007. He ruled...

 on 18 August 2008.

The airstrike

Airstrike

An air strike is an attack on a specific objective by military aircraft during an offensive mission. Air strikes are commonly delivered from aircraft such as fighters, bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters, and others...

 killed 23 people, including eight children, and wounded at least eighteen. The targets of the airstrike were Jalaluddin Haqqani

Jalaluddin Haqqani

Mawlawi Jalaluddin Haqqani is the leader of the Haqqani network, an insurgent group fighting against US-led NATO forces and the government of Afghanistan. He also fought in the 1980s Soviet war in Afghanistan, including in the Operation Magistral...

 and his son Sirajuddin

Sirajuddin Haqqani

Sirajuddin "Siraj" Haqqani is a Pashtun warlord and military leader who fights against American and coalition forces from his base within North Waziristan in Pakistan, where it is claimed he provides shelter to Al Qaeda operatives...

, neither of whom were present at the time. Among 23 people killed was one of Jalaluddin's two wives, sister, sister-in-law and 8 of his grandchildren.

However their family had arrived just ½ hour before, suggesting that the US acted on fresh intelligence, possibly video from the drones transmitted in real time.