Contractor killed in Afghanistan by rocket as she slept

Loss in Afghanistan felt deeply in Pungo
The Virginian-Pilot
By Joanne Kimberlin
December 14, 2013
VIRGINIA BEACH

"I want to see something in the paper besides stories about some Muslim or Islamic kid getting killed by a drone," Joe said. "Americans get killed over there, too, just doing their jobs."

The rocket came over a wall 7,000 miles away. Now, a man sits alone and smokes in his kitchen in Pungo, mourning his wife.

Kathleen "Kitti" Pennell, a civilian contractor working in Afghanistan, was killed Nov. 29 at Bagram Air Field by what the military calls IDF - indirect fire. Official details are scarce, but Joe Pennell was told that his 53-year-old wife died in her quarters when an insurgent-fired rocket hit her barracks.

One of her colleagues, Albert Henry Haas of Illinois, was also killed. Two others were wounded.

Attacks are almost routine at Bagram, a U.S.-run base outside Kabul that shelters tens of thousands of military personnel, contractors and Afghan workers. Incoming mortar rounds and rockets - mostly old, Soviet-made models - trigger sirens and a scramble for bunkers, but few inflict serious damage.

One found its mark as Thanksgiving Day drew to a close. Kitti, a flight coordinator for a company that hauls military supplies, was probably asleep when the rocket sailed over the base's perimeter around midnight.

"They tell me she never knew what hit her," Joe said. "I hope they're not just saying that to make me feel better."
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