After hostile fire of course is the #1 killer (38%) with explosive devices #2 (17%)this includes car bombs, home made (the military calls them "improvised explosive devices)and mines etc placed in roads. What do you think 3-6 costly reasons are for loss of life?
SOme of the other more interesting data are:
7 killed by freindly fire
5 killed while changing tires (two hit by other vehicles and the other three the tires exploded. I have heard that this is a real problem in our military.
1 was electrocuted when he touched live wires that were hanging too low
3 died in their sleep
3 died from falls
3 are under investigation
4 from natural causes
5 of illness
3 were run over by equipment
1 in a vehicle fire
2 because of heat
4 firing range accidents
3 munitions dump explosions
17 listed as other non combat injuries
9 drown. THis one is very interesting. When doing analysis you look for patterns or other clues as to what is going on. Of the 9, 6 were black, and of the three white boys, two drown while trying to save troops that had crashed into the water, and 1 was in a tank and could not get out. THe other 6 were recreational swimmers that went in and never came back out. AS I said, not why just what.
As for hostile fire, 21 were killed while on guard duty, 6 were killed during two different occasions when ambulances were attacked, and three were killed while trying to disperse a crowd.
The average age of the men and women killed was almost 28. Very unlike Vietnam, the largest age group was of course the 20-24(34%), 25-29(21%), 30-34(15%),35-39(10%) and then the 18-19(7%)followed very closely by the 40-44(6%). There were 14 above the age of 45 with 56 being the oldest.
As far as rank they break down like this
SPC 96
SGT 72
CPL 69
PFC 60
Staff SGT 52
PVT 27
Captains 24
Chief warant officers 16
Leutenant 14
SGT 1st class 11
Major 10
1st Lt 9
2nd Lt 6
1st SGT 4
Lt Col. 4
SGT Major 3
Master SGT 3
Petty officer 3rd class 2
Hospital Corpsman 3rd class 2
So I guess they can pick rank while shooting at us also.
Anyway post your guesses as to 3-6 and I will post back tomorrow with the answers. As far as JHA, there are many that show, but to mention them would give away the answers.
d