The US service member killed in Northern Iraq has been identified, the Navy announced Friday.
Chief Petty Officer Jason C. Finan, 34, of Anaheim, California, was advising the Iraqi coalition force when he was killed in an improvised explosive device attack on Thursday.
“The entire Navy Expeditionary Combat Command (NECC) family offers our deepest condolences and sympathies to the family and loved ones of the sailor we lost,” Rear Adm. Brian Brakke, commander of NECC, said in a statement released Friday.
The sailor — assigned to an explosive ordnance disposal mobile unit as part of Operation Inherent Resolve in Iraq — was medevaced off the battlefield but later died of his wounds, a US official told CNN.
While the incident took place in Northern Iraq, the official did not have the exact location or whether the service member was part of a US military advisory team taking part in the battle for Mosul. There were no additional US military personnel wounded in the attack, the official added.
Although it is unclear whether the service member died in the operation to take back Mosul, this is the first combat death since that operation began this week.
Three US military members have been killed in action in Iraq since operations against ISIS began in 2014.