Follow the Story
Families of US service members killed, injured in Pensacola attack sue Saudi Arabia
FBI found al Qaeda’s link to Pensacola shooter through iPhones
Apple denies Barr’s claim it stonewalled Pensacola shooting probe aid
Barr demands Apple unlock Pensacola gunman Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani’s iPhones
Saudi students at Pensacola naval base to be expelled after shooting
Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani wrote ‘the countdown has started’ before Pensacola attack
The shooter who killed three people at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola was a second lieutenant in the Royal Saudi Air Force and one of several hundred allied personnel from around the globe in training there, officials said Friday.
Pensacola regularly trains a “couple hundred” foreign allied military personnel and has done so since World War II, said the base commander, Capt. Tim Kinsella.
“We have students from several different countries. It’s something we’ve been doing for a very long time … with our allies,” he said.
“There’s always been international students here.”
Asked for specifics on the training of the shooter — identified by other officials as Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani — Kinsella would only say, “He was just in the aviation pipeline. That’s part of the FBI to continue their investigation. I’m not going to speak to where he was in the pipeline.”
Some 5,000 foreign students from 153 allied countries — including 852 Saudis — are currently in the US receiving military training, according to Pentagon officials.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, noting that the shooter is a foreign national, said, “The government of Saudi Arabia needs to make things better for these victims.”
Base and Florida officials joined Friday in praising the heroism that took down the shooter.
“I’m devastated. We’re in shock. This is surreal,” said Kinsella. “But I couldn’t be prouder to wear the uniform I wear today.”




