The Pentagon announced Friday that a soldier from Spring Valley was killed by a makeshift bomb in northwestern Afghanistan.

Spc. Rafael Martinez Jr., 36, was one of three soldiers from the Army's 10th Cavalry Regiment who died Thursday when insurgents attacked their unit.

They were fighting between the villages of Moqur and Darreh-Ye-Bum, on Afghanistan's hilly border with Turkmenistan.

Martinez's unit is usually stationed at Fort Carson, Colo., the Pentagon said