Geolocation
Airwars assessment
US Navy warships reportedly bombarded alleged AQAP targets in the vicinity of al-Maroun, in the al-Maraqisha area of Abyan, overnight from March 29th to March 30th. There are no known associated reports of civilian casualties.
Multiple sources indicated that continuous fire from warships off the Abyan coast targeted various AQAP sites in the mountainous al-Maraqisha area, including Mogan and al-Maroun. Images of alleged US illumination shells were posted on social media the day after the reported strikes.
According to one source, four AQAP militants were killed in the course of the shelling in the al-Maraqisha area, though it was unclear in which specific strike these casualties were alleged to have been killed. This claim has been accounted for in event USYEMTr052.
Several local language social media sources also suggested that US ground forces were deployed in the area, variously described as a success and a failure by different sources, but no further information was available.
Late on March 30th, a few Twitter sources indicated that a naval bombardment was taking place in the area, possibly indicating that the strikes continued into the night of March 30th to March 31st. These sources may constitute late reporting of the initial reported strikes.
This reported action took place amid a dramatic intensification of US operations against AQAP in March 2017. On April 3rd, Pentagon spokesperson Captain Jeff Davis said that, from February 28th to the final week of March, fifty US airstrikes were conducted in Yemen.
The incident occured during the night.
Summary
Sources (31) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (5) [ collapse]
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US naval artillery reportedly targeted AQAP sites in al-Maraqisha overnight from March 29th to March 30th. On March 30th, photos of alleged US illumination shells emerged on social media (@demolinari, March 30th 2017)
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US naval artillery reportedly targeted AQAP sites in al-Maraqisha overnight from March 29th to March 30th. On March 30th, photos of alleged US illumination shells emerged on social media (@demolinari, March 30th 2017)
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US naval artillery reportedly targeted AQAP sites in al-Maraqisha overnight from March 29th to March 30th. On March 30th, photos of alleged US illumination shells emerged on social media (@demolinari, March 30th 2017)
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US naval artillery reportedly targeted AQAP sites in al-Maraqisha overnight from March 29th to March 30th. On March 30th, photos of alleged US illumination shells emerged on social media (@sanaawald, March 30th 2017)
Geolocation notes (1) [ collapse]
Reports of the incident mention the village of Al Maroun (المرون) within the area of Jabal Al Maraqisha (جبل المراقشه), for which, due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further. The generic coordinates for Jabal Al Maraqisha are: 13.561668, 46.134923