Maj. John Alex Klinner<\/a>, TSgt. Ashley Pruitt and Capt. Ariana Savino, alongside three airmen from the Ohio Air National Guard who also died, were aboard the KC-135 Stratotanker when it crashed.<\/p>\n\t\t![\"\ufeffalabama](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/alabama-airmen-0135-69b623ad2a9ea.jpg\"\/ "\\"\ufeffAlabama")
<\/p>\n
\n\t\tHearst Owned\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAlabama airmen killed in Iraq plane accident<\/p>\n
Klinner, 33, a Trussville, Alabama, resident, had just been promoted to his current rank in January and had been deployed for less than a week before the crash.<\/p>\n
The aircraft was in \u201cfriendly\u201d airspace, supporting operations against Iran, when an unspecified incident involving another aircraft occurred, according to U.S. Central Command. The other plane landed safely, U.S. military officials said.<\/p>\n
Col. Mike Adams, commander of the 117th, said in a statement:<\/p>\n
“Alex, Ashley and Ariana are and always will be members of the 117th family. Even though they were not members of the Air National Guard, to us they will always be remembered as Vulcan refuelers and Alabamians.”<\/p>\n
The 117th said the circumstances of the incident are under investigation, but it has established a family assistance center to support those affected by the loss; counseling services and chaplains are also available.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UP IN YOUR FULL FORECAST. ALL RIGHT. THANKS, JORDAN. AND BREAKING TONIGHT WE\u2019VE LEARNED THAT THREE OF THE…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19981,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[9977,9966,9967,9980,3763,9971,9749,9965,9964,9974,9769,9979,9891,9976,1278,9973,94,9978,9773,8953,9968,6420,9981,49,9969,9221,9970,9357,8806,212,9972,9750,8980,2174,9959,9975,8707],"class_list":{"0":"post-19980","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-iraq","8":"tag-117th","9":"tag-117th-air-refueling-wing","10":"tag-99th-air-refueling-squadron","11":"tag-active-duty-airman","12":"tag-aircraft","13":"tag-airmen-killed","14":"tag-alabama","15":"tag-ariana-savino","16":"tag-ashley-pruitt","17":"tag-aviation-accident","18":"tag-birmingham","19":"tag-birmingham-airman","20":"tag-capt","21":"tag-family-assistance-center","22":"tag-florida","23":"tag-iran-operations","24":"tag-iraq","25":"tag-iraq-refueling-plane-crash","26":"tag-john-alex-klinner","27":"tag-kc-135-stratotanker","28":"tag-macdill-air-force-base","29":"tag-maj","30":"tag-member","31":"tag-middle-east","32":"tag-mike-adams","33":"tag-military-investigation","34":"tag-military-plane-crash","35":"tag-ohio-air-national-guard","36":"tag-operation","37":"tag-operation-epic-fury","38":"tag-refueling-mission","39":"tag-trussville","40":"tag-u-s-air-force","41":"tag-u-s-central-command","42":"tag-unspecified-incident","43":"tag-vulcan-refuelers","44":"tag-western-iraq"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19980"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19980\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"WVTM](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/wvtm.png\")
<\/p>\n