Here's the timeline of the lie as it grew over the years.
"THE CHANGING STORY OF BRIAN WILLIAMS' 2003 CHINOOK FLIGHT
Since the 2003 incident, Williams’ Chinook story has been recounted countless times and gradually the reporter's role seems to have grown.
NBC reported the incident on March 26, 2003, with the headline, 'Target Iraq: Helicopter NBC’s Brian Williams Was Riding In Comes Under Fire.'
However when the incident was reported the next day by the New York Daily News it stated that a ‘chopper was hit and forced to land. Then the one carrying Williams landed.’
Three days later USA Today carried a similar report that stated: 'NBC's Brian Williams was stranded in the Iraqi desert for three days after a Chinook helicopter ahead of his was attacked by a man who fired a rocket-propelled grenade.
'The grenade just missed, but it forced the group to make an emergency landing. Luckily, a U.S. tank platoon was there and surrounded the helicopters, killing four Iraqis.'
In a 2007 entry from his blog Williams recounts how he was part of a ‘flotilla of four twin-rotor Chinook helicopters’.
‘Some men on the ground fired an RPG through the tail rotor of the chopper flying in front of ours.
'There was small arms fire. … All four choppers dropped their heavy loads and landed quickly and hard on the desert floor,’ he recalled.
By the next year Williams was claiming on his
blog that 'all four of our low-flying Chinooks took fire.'
'The Chinook helicopter flying in front of ours (from the 101st Airborne) took an RPG to the rear rotor, as all four of our low-flying Chinooks took fire,' he wrote.
'We were forced down and stayed down -- for the better (or worse) part of 3 days and 2 nights.'
The tale takes a more dramatic twist during a 2013 appearance on The Late Show With David Letterman. By now Williams is recalling that two helicopter were hit - including his.
‘Two of our four helicopters were hit by ground fire including the one I was in,’ he told Letterman.
Then during his report on January 30, Williams once again told an inaccurate version of events so that now ‘the helicopter we were travelling in was forced down after being hit by an RPG.’
Brian Williams forced to admit he was NOT shot down in the Iraq War Daily Mail Online