The former US army soldier who carried out the New Orleans truck attack that killed 14 victims – and injured dozens more – on New Year’s Day has left a fellow veteran of that military branch fighting to “regain his ability to walk”, according to supporters of the wounded service member.
Before joining other revelers on the city’s famous Bourbon Street to celebrate the start of 2025, Adam Coste had spent more than 12 years in the US army as an infantry company commander and headquarters company commander while serving on multiple combat deployments, according to information posted on a verified GoFundMe campaign established for him.
An article on the army’s website recounts a time that the native of Ocean City, New Jersey, was serving as a mortal platoon leader in Iraq in 2011 during the US’s so-called war on terror. During his last active duty assignment, from 2018 to 2020, Coste worked as an assistant professor of military science at Tulane University in New Orleans.
He then joined the national second world war museum in New Orleans as the educational travel manager for the organization’s institute for the study of war and democracy. It was in that role “where his true passion lies”, providing and producing historical content for tours to both Europe and the Pacific for travelers interested in the allied Forces’ successful effort to defeat the so-called Axis powers.
While Coste rang in the new year on Wednesday a little more than a mile away from the museum, a former army soldier managed to drive a speeding pickup truck displaying the flag of the Islamic State (IS) terror group into people on the first three blocks of Bourbon Street.
The attacker – who served in Afghanistan in 2009 during the US war on terror – was shot dead during a gun battle with police and was unable to detonate homemade bombs hidden in ice chests that he had previously planted further up one of the world’s most festive streets.
Coste – who holds a degree in military history and mechanical engineering from the army’s academy for officers at West Point, New York – was among more than 30 people who were injured alongside the 14 people who were killed. He suffered “extensive injuries to his lower extremities” and was hospitalized after being hit in the attack, wrote Scott Hedge, the organizer of the GoFundMe benefiting Coste.
According to Hedge, the attack left Coste needing “an intensive course of surgeries and rehabilitation to regain his ability to walk”. He had returned to his home the day after the attack but had what was described as his “next procedure” on Tuesday, Hedge said.
Hedge said the fundraising campaign was meant to aid Coste defray his medical and living costs while he “recovers physically [as well as] emotionally from the attack” and awaits returning to work at the museum, which – like Bourbon Street – draws a large mix of locals and tourists.
“Adam would quite literally give you the shirt off his own back if you needed,” Hedge said in a message published on the campaign’s page. “He would never ask for help because he is typically the one helping us.”
The GoFundMe campaign for Coste is one of more than a dozen that are verified by the platform to be in support of Bourbon Street attack victims and their loved ones.
Hedge, a veteran of the US navy, wrote that it was difficult to immediately predict how much Coste’s medical and living expenses would be in the aftermath of the attack. The campaign for Coste, as of Monday, had raised nearly $80,000 of its $100,000 goal.
According to Hedge, money exceeding Coste’s needs would be publicly donated to the charitable Greater New Orleans Foundation. Hedge also said funds would support others victimized by the terror attack.
Local authorities in charge of protecting Bourbon Street had either removed or failed to deploy three different types of barriers designed to prevent intentional ramming attacks such as the one on New Year’s Day. And at least one law office in New Orleans has already announced plans to file a lawsuit against the city on behalf of a survivor alleging negligence.
