Sgt. 1st Class Brian A. Mack, 36, was killed in Mosul, where combat has grown more intense as Iraqi elections scheduled for late January approach. NewsTribune -- The U.S. military has identified a Stryker brigade soldier who died Thursday in Iraq after a roadside bomb hit his patrol.
Sgt. 1st Class Brian A. Mack, 36, was killed in Mosul, where combat has grown more intense as Iraqi elections scheduled for late January approach.
Mack was a member of Task Force Olympia, a combined force that includes the 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division (the second Stryker brigade), other units from Fort Lewis and about 300 members of the 81st Brigade Combat Team, a Washington state National Guard unit headquartered at Camp Murray.
News releases from U.S. Central Command and the Department of Defense do not clarify whether Mack was riding in a Stryker vehicle when the bomb exploded at about 12:15 p.m. Iraq time.
Three other soldiers were injured and taken to a military hospital after the incident. Their conditions were not released.
Mack was popular with fellow soldiers in the brigade, according to messages posted at www.strykernews.com, a Web site dedicated to Stryker soldiers and their families.
“My son considered him a great friend, leader and a brave soldier who instilled the best on his soldiers and had the ability to make them braver,†wrote Silvia Perez-Spiess, a soldier’s mother, who added that her son was in the vehicle just ahead of Mack’s when the bomb exploded.
Elsa Solorio, another mother, wrote that her son thought highly of Mack.
“Juan admired him greatly and always talked to me about him,†she wrote. “He always mentioned him as a great leader, a great soldier, a great friend.â€
Mack was married, and public records suggest he and his wife lived in DuPont before his deployment.