A U.S. soldier is believed to be among the 117 people who died Saturday night in a plane crash near Lagos, Nigeria, according to the U.S. European Command.

Maj. Joseph J. Haydon Jr., 40, chief of the Office of Defense Cooperation at the U.S. Embassy in Abuja, was on the plane’s manifest of passengers and believed to have boarded the plane, according to a EUCOM spokeswoman in Stuttgart, Germany. The Army, as part of its standard procedure, is awaiting positive identification through DNA to confirm Haydon’s status.

Haydon, of Fredericksburg, Va., manages the office that provides a link between the U.S. and Nigerian militaries in such areas as military training, scholarships, civil affairs missions and U.S.-sponsored education programs for Nigerian troops.

Migrated