10 Americans injured in Iranian attack on Saudi air base
Ten U.S. service members were injured in an attack on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, according to several U.S. officials.
The attack consisted of Iranian missiles and drones, sources told CBS News.
Two of the Americans were seriously injured, sources said. Eight were seriously injured, which is a different injury category under the military classification system.
More than 300 U.S. service members have been injured in combat in the U.S.-led war against Iran, and most of them have returned to duty, a U.S. Central Command spokesperson said Friday.
Since the start of the war, 13 U.S. soldiers were killed.
One was wounded in an earlier attack on Prince Sultan Air Base and later died of his injuries, and six were killed in an Iranian strike on a U.S. installation in Kuwait hours after the war began. Six other people were killed when a US refueling plane crashed over Iraq.
Over the past four weeks, Iran has launched retaliatory strikes against U.S.-allied Gulf states, including against installations with a U.S. military presence like Prince Sultan Air Base. Located approximately 60 miles from the Saudi capital Riyadh, the base is operated by the Royal Saudi Air Force and is used by the US Air Force’s 378th Air Expeditionary Wing.
A person familiar with the matter told CBS News that Prince Sultan Air Base was also hit in another attack earlier this week, injuring 14 people. The person did not share the nationality of those injured. A U.S. official said the attack was less serious than that at the end of the week.
The most recent attack in Saudi Arabia could highlight a shortage of missile interceptors in the region as war between the United States and Iran approaches for a month. Fears that Arab states are dangerously short of interceptors have grown. swirled for weekswith some U.S. allied countries warning the White House earlier this month that they were forced to choose which objects to detonate and which not to detonate, CBS News previously reported.
