TRAGIC

Five American Soldiers Killed in Egyptian Black Hawk Crash

The helicopter, carrying soldiers on a peacekeeping mission, reportedly crashed due to “technical issues.”

Five Americans soldiers were among seven people killed in a helicopter crash in the southern Sinai Peninsula of Egypt on Thursday. The soldiers were on a peacekeeping mission in the Sinai. The Americans were identified as Capt. Seth Vernon Vandekamp, 31 of Katy, Texas; Chief Warrant Officer 3 Dallas Gearld Garza, 34, of Fayetteville, North Carolina; Chief Warrant Officer 2 Marwan Sameh Ghabour, 27, of Marlborough, Massachusetts; Staff Sgt. Kyle Robert McKee, 35, of Painesville, Ohio; and Sgt. Jeremy Cain Sherman, 23, of Watseka, Illinois.

Vandekamp was an army doctor on his first overseas assignment after joining the army in 2017, an army spokesperson said. Garza was a Black Hawk pilot who enlisted in the army in 2005 and had done tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. Ghabour was a Black Hawk pilot on his first overseas assignment. McKee was a UH-60 helicopter repairer with almost two decades’ experience in the army. Sherman was a crew chief who had served in Korea and Afghanistan.

Another victim was the first Czech woman soldier to lose her life in a foreign mission since the 1989 Velvet Revolution. Another American peacekeeper survived and was treated at an Israeli hospital. The Black Hawk helicopter crash was “caused by technical issues,” the Czech Defense Ministry said.