2e REG: Sergeant Killed in the French Alps | French Foreign Legion Information

In early July 2026, a French Foreign Legion sergeant serving with the 2nd Foreign Engineer Regiment (2e REG) died during a training course in the Alps. He was 32 years old.

French Foreign Legion - 2e REG - Sergeant Vladislav Pena - Killed in the French Alps - July 2026

On Tuesday, July 7, 2026, Sergeant Vladislav Pena, a 32-year-old legionnaire assigned to the 2e REG at Saint-Christol (in southeastern France), took part in a training exercise in the mountains. He was attending a course to qualify as a high-mountain team leader when he was struck by a falling rock while climbing the Grand Galibier, a peak in the Hautes-Alpes department of the French Alps.

He went into cardiac arrest, and despite the efforts of a military doctor and the high-mountain gendarmerie rescue unit (a specialized police mountain-rescue team), he could not be revived. The sergeant died of his injuries in the helicopter evacuating him to the nearest hospital.

Vladislav Pena was born on August 14, 1994, in Russia. He joined the Foreign Legion on July 10, 2014, just weeks before his 20th birthday. After 12 years in the Legion, he was single and had no children.

At Saint-Christol on July 15, 2026, the entire regiment gathered at its home base, Quartier Maréchal Koenig, to pay final tribute to Staff Sergeant Pena, who was promoted posthumously. The ceremony was presided over by General Laurent Cluzel, Inspector of the French Army, and led locally by Colonel Paul Lemaire, commanding officer of the 2e REG.

The ceremony continued under the direction of General Cyrille Youchtchenko, commander of the Foreign Legion, at the Legion section of the Coudoulet cemetery, where Staff Sergeant Pena was laid to rest.

Three days later, on July 18, the members of his climbing rope team — who had been with him when the accident occurred — returned to the mountains to honor his memory. In the presence of the regimental commander and the general commanding the 27th Mountain Infantry Brigade (27e BIM, the parent formation that includes the 2e REG), they climbed to the summit of the Pointe des Cerces.

The accident comes two months after a similar tragedy, when a legionnaire from the 1er REG died during a training exercise.

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