The U.S. Army has released the names of the five soldiers who died Friday evening when their MH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashed into the Mediterranean Sea.
The victims of the crash are Chief Warrant Officer 3 Stephen R. Dwyer, 38, of Clarksville, Tennessee; Chief Warrant Officer 2 Shane M. Barnes, 34, of Sacramento, California; Staff Sgt. Tanner W. Grone, 26, of Gorham, New Hampshire; Sgt. Andrew P. Southard, 27, of Apache Junction, Arizona; and Sgt. Cade M. Wolfe, 24, of Mankato, Minnesota.
The five soldiers were part of the Army’s Special Operations Command and assigned to 1st Battalion, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne). A senior defense official wouldn’t say whether that the unit was in the area to support Israel but did say that they were “there in response to the dynamic security environment in the region.”
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The official said that “there is currently a contingent of U.S. military forces, including planning and logistics experts to support U.S. preparedness, to ensure the safety and security of American citizens in the region if needed.”
The Pentagon announced the crash Saturday afternoon but did not release details. The statement from U.S. European Command simply said that “a U.S. military aircraft conducting training operations in the eastern Mediterranean suffered a mishap and went down.” The…
