Thursday, April 11, 2013

US Army Chief Warrant Officer 3 Matthew Ruffner killed in helicopter crash

US Army Chief Warrant Officer 3 Matthew Ruffner, serving with the Pennsylvania Army National Guard’s Company B, 1-104th Attack Reconnaissance Battalion, was one of two soldiers killed on 9th April 2013 when their helicopter crashed during a reconnaissance mission in Nangarhar province.

34-year-old CWO3 Ruffner graduated from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 2003 with a bachelor’s degree in criminology. He joined the military in 1997, serving initially as a mechanic in the Army Reserve’s 705th Transportation Company in Dayton, Ohio, before transferring to the Army National Guard’s 110th Infantry.

He went on to complete warrant officer training and transferred to the aviation career field in 2005 serving as an aviation life support equipment officer, tactical operations officer and instructor pilot. More recently, he was employed as a full-time Apache instructor pilot for the Pennsylvania National Guard’s Army Aviation Support Facility.

His awards and decorations include the Army Achievement Medal, three Army Reserve Component Achievement Medals and the Parachutist Badge.

The other Pennsylvania National Guardsman killed in the crash was Chief Warrant Officer 2 Jarett Yoder.

The cause of the crash is being investigated.

No comments:

Post a Comment

We will not publish comments that are, in our opinion, not suitable for the purpose of this website.