One soldier has been reprimanded and another is waiting on results of a pre-trial hearing in connection with a failed Humvee air drop over Germany last year.
Video of the incident — which involved three Humvees plummeting to the ground — went viral on social media.
Sgt. John Skipper faced an Article 32 hearing on May 31 for destruction of government property and making a false official statement, while the soldier who recorded the video received a letter of reprimand for his involvement, according to Christian Marquardt, a spokesman for 7th Army Training Command in Germany.
"The reprimand addressed the unprofessional comments the soldier made during the video, and the fact that he shared the video with others, which resulted in it being posted to social media by an unknown individual," Marquardt told Army Times on Friday.
The soldier, whose name was not released by the Army, received the letter from his colonel, the commander of Joint Multinational Readiness Center, Marquardt said.
Skipper, a cavalry scout with 1st Battalion, 91st Cavalry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team in Vicenza, Italy, was responsible for making sure the parachutes were rigged properly for the air drop from a C-130 over Hohenfels Training Area in Germany on April 11, 2016.
Three Humvees slipped from their parachute rigging and plummeted hundreds of feet to the ground, causing in the neighborhood of half a million dollars' damage.
Skipper could face one to 10 years in confinement, depending on whether a military judge finds that the incident was due to negligence or willful destruction.
Meanwhile, the reprimanded soldier was on the ground recording the crashes. His video ended up with more than 1 million views on the U.S. Army W.T.F! moments Facebook page, and in it he could be heard hysterically laughing, cheering and shouting "Yes!" as the Humvees fell.
"In the event this case progresses further, we will release appropriate information at each stage of the process," Marquardt told Army Times.
Meghann Myers is the Pentagon bureau chief at Military Times. She covers operations, policy, personnel, leadership and other issues affecting service members.
