"An AH-6i reconnaissance helicopter belonging to the Ministry of National Guard crashed inside Saudi territory in Najran Region due to a technical malfunction," coalition spokesman Turki al-Maliki said in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency. "The accident resulted in the martyrdom of its aircrew, consisting of two officers." The deaths are the first coalition military fatalities since the long-running war with the Iran-backed Houthis reignited in July.
The Houthis tell a different story. Late on Saturday, their military spokesman Yahya Saree said the group had "downed an Apache helicopter belonging to the Saudi enemy" in the same area, and on Sunday the Houthis released footage they said showed a Saudi AH-6i being shot down by a missile near Najran. Reuters reported the footage did not clearly show the incident and that it could not verify the claim; there was no immediate Saudi comment on the footage itself. Al-Maliki answered Saree's post directly on X, publishing a photo of several Apache helicopters lined up.
"You claim to have shot it down, but it will enter the battlefield soon." — Turki al-Maliki, Saudi-led coalition spokesman
The crash came in the middle of a heavy weekend of Houthi fire. The coalition said it intercepted two drones overnight in the Riyadh area and a third over the oil-rich Eastern Province, and that two ballistic missiles launched by the Houthis toward Khamis Mushait, in the kingdom's southwest, were intercepted early Sunday. Saudi Civil Defense issued "potential danger" alerts through the national early-warning system in Riyadh, Abha and Khamis Mushait before announcing the danger had passed. On Saturday, al-Maliki said coalition forces had intercepted and destroyed four drones over several hours, and the coalition released footage it said showed strikes destroying two ballistic missile launchers in Saada, northern Yemen, after they had been used to fire missiles toward Saudi Arabia.
The escalation follows the collapse of an uneasy four-year truce. Fighting surged back to life in July and intensified last month when the Houthis seized strategic territory along the Red Sea coast. The group has struck tankers in the Red Sea, oil facilities and Riyadh's King Khalid International Airport — where strikes a week ago killed 13 people, the deadliest attack inside Saudi Arabia in more than a decade — and has declared a maritime blockade on the kingdom since Iran blockaded the Strait of Hormuz. For their part, the Houthis reported on Saturday that Saudi strikes killed 12 people in Yemen, including three children.
Saudi Arabia has led the coalition backing Yemen's internationally recognised government since March 2015. With Egypt's parliament holding an emergency session on Sunday on President Sisi's request to authorise support for the kingdom's defence, the war the coalition has fought for a decade is pulling in a wider front by the week.
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