Marine from Missouri among those killed in Afghanistan

WENTZVILLE, Mo. (AP) — One of the 13 U.S. service members killed in a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport in Afghanistan was a Marine who grew up in the St. Louis area.

KMOX Radio reports that 20-year-old Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz of Wentzville, Missouri, was among those killed Thursday. His father, Mark Schmitz, said Marines came to his home at 2:40 a.m. Friday to confirm his son's death.

Jared Schmitz was among a group of Marines sent back to Afghanistan to assist with evacuation efforts, his father said.

“His life meant so much more. I’m so incredibly devastated that I won’t be able to see the man that he was very quickly growing into becoming," Mark Schmitz said of his son.

Two officials said the number of Afghans killed rose to 169 on Friday. The bombing was blamed on Afghanistan’s offshoot of the Islamic State group, a lethal enemy of both the Taliban and the West.