Renowned reporter Michael Hastings, 33, dies in tragic fiery crash after finding fame for bringing down Stanley McChrystal and his touching account of losing early love in Iraq

Hastings' 2010 interview with the top military commander in Afghanistan won the reporter fame and awards and cost the general his job

Hastings died early Tuesday morning in a fiery Los Angeles car crash

The journalist who won fame as the man who caused the downfall of General Stanley McChrystal died Tuesday in an horrific early morning car crash.



Michael Hastings was known as a no-nonsense reporter. His candid Rolling Stone interview with the Afghanistan general in 2010 was only one of many of the 33-year-old’s accomplishments.



Hastings most recently worked for BuzzFeed , where Editor-in-Chief Ben Smith called the late reporter ‘a great, fearless journalist with an incredible instinct for the story, and a gift for finding ways to make his readers care about anything he covered from wars to politicians.’

He is survived by his wife Elise Jordan.

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Tragic: Star reporter who spelled the end of General McChrystal's career thanks to a Rolling Stone interview has died in a California car crash

Hastings was pronounced dead at the scene of Tuesday morning's fiery crash

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Hastings rocketed to fame after the article 'The Runaway General' ran in Rolling Stone magazine in June 2010.

Hastings' intimate access to top Afghanistan commander McChrystal and his day to day comings and goings gave the reporter a look into the mind of a top level war general.

Where most reporters would have taken the generals' irreverent mockery--of President Obama, Joe Biden, and other non-military commanders--with a grain of salt, Hastings saw it as the stuff of great news reporting.

Friends and colleagues mourn Michael Hastings on Twitter...



Shocked at the news of the death of my friend Mike Hastings @mmhastings - interned with him at Newsweek in college and he was a great friend — Meghan McCain (@MeghanMcCain) June 19, 2013

Fearless reporter Michael Hastings passed away early this morning in L.A. http://t.co/0KLx6CqvO4 — Michael Moore (@MMFlint) June 19, 2013

If you weren’t fortunate enough to know Michael Hastings personally, you sure knew his work. RIP. http://t.co/8AdlaCuYz6 — Erik Malinowski (@erikmal) June 18, 2013

Though convention dictated that he repay the general and his associates for his access with a glossed-over, reverential piece, Hastings produced a raw account of what the actual General McChrystal looked like as he stood at the helm of the war in Afghanistan.

And he didn't look good. The decorated soldier came off as crude and remarks about higher-ups like, 'Vice President Biden...Who's that?' spelled his doom.



Mere hours after Hastings' article appeared in Rolling Stone, McChrystal was summoned from the war to Washington, where he offered his resignation.

Big fall: Hastings published Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal's behind the scenes comments about civilian commanders and the general later stepped down

No stranger to tragedy: Hastings chronicled his time in Baghdad, where his then fiance Andi Parhamovich (left) was killed in an attack, in a bestselling memoir (right)



The Vermont native was also the author of two books about America’s most recent wars.



THE MAN WHO TOOK DOWN GENERAL STANLEY McCHRYSTAL

Michael Hastings was well placed as journalist within the tight circle around Afghanistan top commander McChrystal, but the 'hard-charging' journalist was not interested in painting a rosy picture of the war chief's unseemly conduct in this Rolling Stone piece The Runaway General in 2010.

Hastings' intimate access to McChrystal and his close allies was unusual and showed him an often immature side of the man in charge of all NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, beginning with a loose-lipped night of drinking in Paris. 'In private,' writes Hastings in The Runaway General, 'Team McChrystal likes to talk sh** about many of Obama's top people on the diplomatic side.' Loose lips like that would have gone un-noted by some journalists, a sort of traditional thank you for access granted, but not by Hastings. The general seemed to have a particular dislike for Vice President Joe Biden. 'Are you asking about Vice President Biden,' McChrystal jokes at one point."Who's that?"' Many comments like that made it into the final, published article and within hours of its publishing, McChrystal had been summoned to Washington, all the way from the war theater, where he would offer his resignation.



In the Operators, Hastings writes a more detailed, long form account of what the war in Afghanistan looked like from the point of view of the commanders on the ground.

His other book, I Lost My Love in Baghdad, is also a chronicle of war, but with added personal tragedy.

Hastings went to Iraq to cover the war at the age of 25. Soon after, his girlfriend Andi Parhamovich followed.

The two met in New York in 2005. When he left to cover the war, she took a job with the National Democratic Institute, a group dedicated to spreading democratic practices around the world.



While on a mission for her employer, Parhamovich was killed in a Baghdad carbombing. The two were set to marry. She was 28.

A long, dark period for Hastings followed and I Lost My Love in Baghdad became the bestselling result of his grieving process.

He would later find love with writer Elise Jordan, a writer and former speechwriter for Condoleezza Rice and National Security Council communications strategist who frequently appears as a commentator on political news programs.



The Baghdad incident, however, would not be the first senseless tragedy to befall Hastings.

Early Tuesday morning, around 4:15am, a car plowed into a tree in Hollywood, California and burst into flames. The body was too badly burned to be immediately identified, reports KTLA .



But by Tuesday evening, both Buzzfeed and Rolling Stone had identified Hastings as the victim of the horrific crash.



He was pronounced dead at the scene. The cause of the accident remains unclear.

Now, Hastings’ wife, Elise, must carry the same weight her husband once did after Parhamovich’s death in Iraq.

Wife: Hastings found love despite his tragic past in writer/commentator Elise Jordan. Now she must bear the same burden of tragedy her late husband once did

Tragic life: Hastings also wrote a book detailing his time as a 25-year-old war reporter and the fiance he lost in a Baghdad ambush

Hastings is also survived by his beloved corgi Bobby Sneakers.



Rolling Stone wrote an obituary for the brash, hard-hitting star reporter with appropriate honesty:



‘Hard-charging, unabashedly opinionated, Hastings was original and at times abrasive. He had little patience for flacks and spinmeisters and will be remembered for his enthusiastic breaches of the conventions of access journalism.’

Bittersweet legacy: Hastings is survived by his wife Elise and his beloved corgi Bobby Sneakers