Incident Code
Incident Date
Location
Geolocation
Geolocation
Airwars Assessment
(Previous Incident Code: YEM257 )
A US Central Command spokesperson announced on January 12th 2017 that a strike in al-Bayda province had killed one AQAP operative on January 8th. This confirmed reports that a US drone strike had killed at least one alleged AQAP militant in al-Bayda on that evening. There were no known reports of civilian harm.
Sources suggested that the strike targeted a car, killing alleged AQAP leader, Abd al Ghani al Rasas. Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook confirmed in a statement on January 13th that the strike had killed Abd al Ghani al Rasas, described as an AQAP “terrorist leader”.
According to Hadramout Net, eyewitnesses indicated that his “companions” were also killed in the strike, though no other sources reported this. Airwars has therefore assessed that a minimum of one militant was reportedly killed, with a maximum of three, including al Rasas and “companions”.
Sources differed over the exact circumstances of the strike. Most reported that the strike took place in Maswara district, though some instead mentioned the al-Suma’a district. Some suggested that the car was targeted in transit, while others indicated that it was parked in a walled area.
Geolocation Notes
Reports of the incident mention a strike on a vehicle in the district of Maswarah ( مديرية مسورة). One source alleged that the exact coordinates for this incident are: 14.359469, 45.732200, we can confirm that this location is within the district mentioned, however, due to limited information available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further.
Reports of the incident mention a strike on a vehicle in the district of Maswarah ( مديرية مسورة)
Imagery: Google Earth
The alleged exact location of the strike according to one source
Imagery: Google Earth