The Pentagon has released the names of three American servicemen killed in an unmanned aerial drone strike on a base in northeast Jordan on Sunday.
According to a Defense Department news release issued Monday, Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, 46, of Carrollton, Georgia; Spc. Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, of Waycross, Georgia; and Spc. Breonna Alexsondria Moffett, 23, of Savannah, Georgia, died on January 28, 2024, in Jordan. The incident took place when “a one-way unmanned aerial system (OWUAS) impacted their container housing units,” according to the Pentagon.
Sabrina Singh, Pentagon assistant press secretary, told reporters Monday that the strike appeared to be distinct from previous attacks because it occurred in residential quarters and “pretty early in the morning.”
“People were actually in their beds when the drone impacted,” she went on to say.
Singh also attributed the drone assault to an Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-backed militia. The United States has stated that the groups operate in Syria and Iraq. She stated that the strike bore the “footprints” of Kataib Hezbollah, but that no final assessment has been made, and that US forces will reply “at a time and place of their choosing.”
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The agency said the attack is being investigated. Later Monday, a US official stated that the drone used in the attack seemed to be an Iranian drone, a “type of Shahed drone” — the type of one-way attack drone that Iran has been supplying to Russia.
The attack occurred at Tower 22, an outpost where approximately 350 US Army and Air Force personnel are stationed, according to the Department of Defense.
The United States Central Command announced Sunday night that at least 34 people were hurt, but Singh said Monday that the figure had risen to more than 40. Eight wounded military members were evacuated, with some in serious condition but all stable, according to a defense official.
The servicemen who were killed and injured were resting in their base quarters when the drone strike occurred in the early hours of the morning.
The strike was believed to be the bloodiest attack on US service members since 13 Americans were murdered in a suicide bombing in Kabul as the US prepares to withdraw from Afghanistan in 2021.