First American Pilot Killed Had a Wife and 2 Children

The first American combat death of the Persian Gulf war was that of a 33-year-old Navy pilot--the father of two young children and a Sunday school teacher.

The Pentagon on Thursday night identified Lt. Cmdr. Michael S. Speicher of Jacksonville, Fla., as missing in action after his single-seat F/A-18 Hornet fighter-bomber was shot down by an Iraqi surface-to-air missile over Iraq.

Speicher had been listed as an MIA because his body was not recovered. Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, however, had said earlier that the pilot was killed.

Based at Cecil Field Naval Station in Jacksonville, Speicher flew from the aircraft carrier Saratoga, which has its home port in Mayport, a Jacksonville suburb.

A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Cmdr. Edward Lundquist, said no other information about the victim would be released, in accordance with standard Pentagon procedures on military personnel who are missing in action.

A Jacksonville native, Speicher was married and had two children, a 3-year-old daughter and a 1-year-old son, said a family friend in Florida, who asked not to be identified. The family declined to talk to reporters.

Speicher, a graduate of Florida State University with a degree in accounting and management, also taught Sunday school, the family friend said.

Twenty-one Saratoga sailors were killed Dec. 22 when a ferry carrying them off the coast of Israel capsized. The carrier is now stationed in the Red Sea.