Civil war in the Yemen Arab Republic during early May threatened the lives of U.S. and other foreign nationals living in San‘a, the capital. After the U.S. embassy requested that they be evacuated, the Central Command undertook an airlift, using aircraft from Air Combat Command and AMC.
On May 7 and 9, a C–141 from the 4th Airlift Squadron, 62d Alft Wg; four C–130s from the 41st Airlift Squadron of the 23d Operations Group; and a C–21, temporarily assigned to the 4404th Composite Wing (Provisional) and the 4410th Airlift Squadron (Provisional), flew the airlift. They evacuated 623 people, including 448 U.S. citizens, from San‘a to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. From Riyadh, the evacuees obtained commercial air transportation elsewhere.