Sig Christenson, Marc Duvoisin
San Antonio Express-News
Security guards at the entrance to a training annex at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland twice came under fire early Saturday morning from unknown assailants. The second ambush sparked a brief gunbattle. No injuries were reported.
The first attack occurred around 2:15 a.m., when Air Force Security Forces personnel at the entrance gate of the Chapman Training Annex on the Southwest Side saw a sedan drive past and heard gunshots and the sound of bullets whistling past them, police and Air Force officials said.
The guards called for backup in case the attackers returned. Shortly before 5 a.m., the same sedan stopped just east of the gate at Ray Ellison Boulevard and Medina Base Road. “For a second time, shots were fired at the Air Force security personnel,” said Sgt. Washington Moscoso, a spokesman for the San Antonio Police Department.
This time, the Air Force guards returned fire with their service weapons, typically 9mm handguns, and the sedan sped off. No one was injured in the exchange of gunfire, said JBSA spokeswoman Stefanie Antosh.
Police said they found shell casings near where the car had stopped, but it wasn’t known how many rounds were fired.
Antosh said there was more than one shooter in the sedan but the exact number was unknown, as was the attackers’ motive. No details of the car’s make, model or color were released.
Authorities closed the gate to the annex and directed motorists to use other routes. The gate reopened around 9:40 a.m., and the installation’s security condition remained unchanged at Force Protection Condition Bravo.
The Air Force base was never locked down, Antosh said.
“We don’t know what, if anything, started it,” she said. “It would be speculating. But it wasn’t an active threat to the installation, and there is no active threat to the installation.”
Lackland resumed normal operations. It was not clear if Air Force Security Forces would assign more personnel to the gates at Lackland and other facilities on JBSA, which include Randolph AFB, the Army’s Fort Sam Houston and the Camp Bullis training ground.
SAPD officers responded to the scene of the shooting and helped to collect evidence. The department was investigating the incident as an “aggravated assault with deadly weapon.”
The Chapman Annex, located just west of Lackland’s main facilities, is the home of Air Force special warfare training. Long known as the Medina Annex, it was renamed in 2020 for Air Force Master Sgt. John Chapman, a combat air controller who was killed in a battle in Afghanistan on March 4, 2002, and was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.
The gate where Saturday’s shooting occurred faces Valley Hi Elementary school. A display of an F-104 fighter jet stands behind the guard shack, which was attended by a lone security officer on Saturday afternoon.
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