An airman has died after falling during a pregame rappelling demonstration at a college football game in Texas, prompting criticism of “military showboating.”
During a demonstration at the University of Texas at San Antonio’s annual Salute to Armed Forces & Veterans game on Saturday, an unidentified service member lost control of his rope and fell to the ground. He was transported to a nearby hospital, where he died.
The football game continued just 10 minutes after the airman was transported to the hospital.
The rappelling team consisted of members of the 6th Combat Training Squadron, Detachment 2, Task & Purpose reported. “We are deeply saddened by the incident that occurred at the start of tonight’s football game. Our heartfelt thoughts and prayers are with the soldier who was affected, his family and his military colleagues,” a UT San Antonio spokesperson wrote in an Instagram post Saturday evening.
The fatal incident comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has emphasized a renewed “warrior ethos” within the U.S. military, something critics quickly highlighted.
“Thanks @PeteHegseth @SecWar for yet another pointless and tragic recruiting spectacle,” Jackie Singh, an aide on President Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign, wrote on X after the fatal incident.
Dem strategist Chris D. Jackson called the stunt “absolutely sickening.”
“This ridiculous military showboating at football games needs to STOP,” he wrote on X.
“Now a man could lose his life, all because some Hegseth-like official apparently thought putting on a macho spectacle for people who came to watch FOOTBALL was a brilliant idea. These men are human beings, NOT props for someone’s political theater.”
Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson pushed back against the criticism, saying it was “disgraceful that anyone would use the tragic death of a service member to try to score political points.”
Hegseth, for his part, spent Saturday at a different sports stadium, attending a football game between the University of Tennessee and the University of Alabama. Before the game, he administered the enlistment oath to young men and women representing all service branches and the Tennessee National Guard. As he did so, he told them:
“We’ve had three core principles from the beginning of showing up at the War Department: restore the warrior ethos, rebuild the military, reestablish deterrence.”
