U.S. defense officials are confirming that an American drone went down in Somalia today, reports Politico.

It would mark the first such loss in Somalia.

From Politico:

“During the course of a routine surveillance mission along the coast of Somalia on May 27, a military remotely piloted aircraft crashed in a remote area near the shoreline of Mogadishu,” a defense spokesman told POLITICO on Tuesday.

Earlier in the day, the Islamic militant group al-Shabaab posted on Twitter what it claimed were photos of a downed American reconnaissance drone.

In the photos, you can clearly see camera components and one broken part marked with the word "Schiebel," a corporation that develops unmanned aerial vehicles.

Initial media reports thought the aircraft was American, but Schiebel, an Austrian company that sells technology around the world, doesn't list the U.S. as one of its buyers.

A governor for that region of Somalia told Reuters that al-Shabaab militants had shot at the aircraft for hours before it crashed.

Defense officials deny that the drone was shot down, according to Politico.

The American military is supporting an effort by thousands of African Union forces to beat back Islamic militants in southern Somalia, according to the BBC.

This would not be the first time the U.S. lost a drone. The Iranian government has claimed on multiple occasions to have recovered an American unmanned aerial vehicles, and in December 2011, the U.S. confirmed it had lost contact with a drone operating over Iran.

Update: A previous version of this story had a headline that said it was confirmed that Al Shabab had captured the drone. All that's been confirmed is that the drone went down.