CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM
More than 200 friends and soldiers from the 66th Engineer Company welcomed back Spc. Bryant Jacobs at the Honolulu Airport last night. Jacobs has been in rehab for more than a year after being injured in an explosion in Iraq.
|
|
Soldier returns to isles after long recuperation
Friends surprise Spc. Bryan Jacobs at Honolulu Airport
By Audrey McAvoy
Associated Press
About 200 troops cheered and clapped wildly last night to welcome back to Hawaii the last member of their company from Iraq: a soldier who lost his large intestine and chunks of his legs when a roadside bomb went off under his truck.
Supporting himself with a cane, Army Spc. Bryant Jacobs, 25, gingerly walked down the steps of a chartered bus to meet whooping members of the 66th Engineer Company and their families.
"It feels great. You want to see your old guys again and catch up," said Jacobs, his neck buried in a pile of leis. "I couldn't wait to get off the bus to see everyone again. It's been a long time."
Most had not seen Jacobs since the day a bomb -- or improvised explosive device -- blew up under his truck in Kirkuk on Dec. 3, 2004. One soldier, Spc. David P. Mahlenbrock, was killed by the blast.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Bryant Jacobs, injured in the explosion of a roadside bomb in the winter of 2004 while serving in Iraq, was greeted by friends and family June 10 as he arrived at the airport in Salt Lake City. Jacobs, an avid snowboarder, hopes to return to the slopes.
|
|
Jacobs' team of "IED hunters" was finishing up an outing to look for the bombs and had cleared the area where the bomb went off just some 30 minutes before.
The blast tore chunks out of Jacobs' left calf and his right thigh. Doctors had to amputate his left index finger.
Jacobs said he remembers being uncomfortable and falling in and out of consciousness. The military flew him to Kirkuk Air Base for medical care. He later moved to Kuwait, then Germany and finally Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.
He has had more than 30 surgical operations in the last 16 months.
Sgt. Ming Chiu, who was Jacobs' team leader at the time of the explosion, said he was happy to see his friend again.
"He's the hero. A lot of people would just give up in his predicament. But he's just like, 'I don't care, I'm going to fight through it and I'm coming home. I'm here to see all of my buddies,'" Chiu said. "This is his welcome-home party and he deserves it."
The company had been in Iraq for 11 months and had been due to return home in a few months at the time of the explosion.
The military will award Jacobs, of Salt Lake City, a Purple Heart along with four other medals Tuesday at a Schofield Barracks ceremony.
Jacobs said he plans to play some golf and go to a luau during his one-week stay in the islands. Then he will go back to Washington for more rehabilitation.
The 66th Engineer Company -- then known as B Company 65th Engineer Battalion -- deployed to Iraq in January 2004. The rest of the soldiers returned in February 2005. The company is part of the 25th Infantry Division based at Schofield Barracks on Oahu.
