An off-target 155mm artillery shell landed near reserve soldiers during a training exercise Tuesday and killed five of them and wounded 10, the army command said. It said three of the wounded were badly hurt. Less than three months ago, on April 23, seven Israeli airmen were killed in another training accident when their transport helicopters collided during a flight over the occupied West Bank. The army said in a statement that Tuesday's accident occurred when a reserve unit was conducting an exercise involving the capture of a position at a training base in southern Israel. Army officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the base was near Tzeelim in the southern Negev desert, 15 miles from the Egyptian border. Israel radio said the shell was fired by troops training at one section of the base and fell near other soldiers training in a different area. ``According to the information I have, the reason for the accident was human error,'' Maj. Gen. Uri Saguy told Israel army radio. Saguy, chief of army ground forces, was at the exercise and ordered an immediate investigation, the army said. One of those wounded, 29-year-old Yair Cohen, told Israel radio from his bed at Soroka Hospital in Beersheba: ``I stepped out of the armored personnel carrier and there was an explosion. ... I was hit in the leg by shrapnel. I felt pain in my leg and saw blood and started running.'' Israeli men up to the age of 55 serve up to a month each year on reserve duty after three years of compulsory service starting at age 18. One of those seriously wounded Tuesday was a female instructor.
