Fort Hood officials have released the names of the four crew members who died last Monday evening after their UH-60L Black Hawk crashed during a routine training mission.
The members of the First Army Division West who died Monday were:
- 40-year-old of Hays, Kan.,
- 40-year-old Chief Warrant Officer Stephen B. Cooley of Cantonment, Fla.,
- 35-year-old Sgt. 1st Class Jason M. Smith of Destrehan, La.,
- 40-year-old Chief Warrant Officer Michael F. Tharp of Katy, Texas.
The cause of the crash remains unknown and will be investigated by a team of the Army Combat Readiness Center from Fort Rucker, Ala., Fort Hood officials said.
Monday’s incident was the latest in a string of crashes involving military Black Hawk helicopters in recent months.
This year, 11 troops were killed when a helicopter crashed in the Florida coast in March and seven service members were injured in August when a helicopter crash-landed off the Japanese coast.
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