ELIZABETHTOWN, Ky. (AP) — A Kentucky man who joined the Army straight out of high school is the seventh U.S. service member to die in combat during the Iran war, the Pentagon announced Monday.
Army Sgt. Benjamin N. Pennington, 26, of Glendale, Kentucky, died Sunday after being wounded during a March 1 attack on the Prince Sultan Air Base, Saudi Arabia, a Pentagon statement said.
Mike Bell, retired pastor of Glendale Christian Church, said he’d known Pennington since he was a toddler and got a call from Pennington's father when the soldier was hurt.
“I talked to Tim Saturday morning, and he was doing a little better, and they were talking about maybe moving him to Germany,” Bell said. But he said Tim Pennington called again that evening to ask for prayers as his son's condition was worsening, and then later told him the soldier had succumbed to his injuries.
“He was just a quiet person,” said Bell, noting that Pennington attended the church’s after-school program. “I mean, he never attracted attention because he was just steady doing what he needed to do to do it. Does that make sense?”
Pennington was assigned to the 1st Space Battalion, 1st Space Brigade of the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command based at Fort Carson, Colorado.
The unit’s mission focused on “missile warning, GPS, and long-haul satellite communications” according to their website.
“This just breaks my heart,” Keith Taul, judge-executive of Hardin County, where Pennington was from, said in a written statement emailed to The Associated Press. “I have known the family for at least 30 years. I can’t imagine the pain and suffering they are experiencing. To lose a single service member is just a devastating blow. But when it is one of our own, we grieve as a community.”
Glendale is an unincorporated town of about 300 residents south of the Hardin County seat of Elizabethtown.
In a statement posted on social media, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear called Pennington “a hero who sacrificed everything serving our country.”
Source: WPLG
