FORT IRWIN — The Nevada National Guard on Friday released the names of those involved in Tuesday's tank rollover accident at the National Training Center.
Staff Sgt. David W. Gallagher, 51, of Las Vegas, died after the Abrams M1A1 tank in which he and three other soldiers were traveling rolled over.
The exercise allows Marines "to evaluate our ability to offload personnel and equipment, generate combat power across the Atlantic, and then redeploy assets through a known logistically complicated area of operation," 1st Lt. Robert Locker, a Marine communications officer, said in a release.
After a year and a half since the Army took delivery on the first of its souped-up new version of the M1 Abrams main battle tank, the Pentagon's Joint Systems Manufacturing Center in Lima, Ohio is ramping up to deliver the service's first full brigade of upgraded warhorses to bring the pain downrange.
He's an Oklahoman and an Air Force vet, an actor and martial artist. The intensity of his badassery formed the basis of one of the earliest and most ubiquitous internet memes. He's a fictional member of Delta Force and a Texas Ranger, his beard a source of such virile endurance and strength that it makes Samson's biblical mane look like a bouquet of hobo pubes.
Now, Norris will live forever as the ultimate instrument of righteousness: an M1 Abrams tank.
General Dynamics Land Systems has secured a production contract from the U.S. Army to upgrade 100 Abrams main battle tanks into the new M1A2 SEP v.3 configuration. The Army had earlier accepted the first of about a half-dozen initial production versions of the modernized main battle tank late last year.
