It will be interesting to see if this young man is recognized with the Medal of Honor.
TLC
I hope so! I also hope and pray for the best recover, care and love he can get.
JRC
South Carolina Senate gives thanks to wounded war hero
BY JEFF WILKINSON
jwilkinson(a)thestate.com
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Pictures and full article at:
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2011/mar/10/senate-gives-thanks-to-wou...
Columbia -- Marine Lance Cpl. William Kyle Carpenter, his face missing an eye and
crisscrossed with deep scars, stood on the floor of the S.C. Senate on Wednesday to
receive the thanks of his state.
Carpenter, 21, of Gilbert lost the eye, most of his teeth and use of his right arm from a
grenade blast Nov. 21 near Marjah in the Helmand Province of Afghanistan.
Friends and family say he threw himself in front of the grenade to protect his best friend
in Afghanistan, Cpl. Nick Eufrazio.
Carpenter just remembers seeing the grenade. Then a white flash. Then a fellow Marine
telling him he would be fine. Then, four weeks later, he woke up in a hospital in Germany.
"The second I woke up, I saw my family by my bedside," he said.
The Senate resolution noted Carpenter "suffered catastrophic wounds in the cause of
freedom" and "has shown himself worthy of the name Marine."
Carpenter shook almost every senator's hand -- with his left hand -- after the
reading.
He said his experience was nothing unusual in war. People back home, worried about the
economy and gas prices, he said, should remember Marines and soldiers are still being
maimed and killed.
"The light is on me right now," he said. "But I'm hoping what happened
to me will help remind people that things like this happen every day and people don't
see it. I'm proud of what my fellow Marines have done there and are doing there
now."
Carpenter and a 12-man squad from his 9th Regiment, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force, were
on patrol outside Marjah. They were in the fifth month of a seven-month deployment.
They were in a village they called Shadier, between two other villages they named Shady
and Shadiest.
They had been in hard combat, he said, as the Marines were pushing out farther from their
base, expanding the territory they controlled. "For two days we had been hit pretty
hard," he said. "We moved into (enemy) territory, and they didn't like
it." He was fighting on a rooftop when the grenade hit.
"I took 99 percent of the blast," he said. "But one little piece of
shrapnel got by me and went into (Eufrazio's) brain."
According to Sen. Jake Knotts, who sponsored and read the proclamation, Eufrazio suffered
a serious brain injury and is recovering in Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland. He is now
speaking and talking.
Carpenter also spent most of his recovery time -- which so far has included 25 surgeries
and more than 100 hours of physical therapy -- at Bethesda.
There, he said, he was inspired by the other patients, many of whom had no legs or no eyes
or no arms.
"I'm lucky," he said.
See also:
http://woundedtimes.blogspot.com/2011/03/marine-lance-cpl-william-kyle-ca...
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Still in the Fight: Scars
By MICHAEL D. FAY
March 17, 2011, 6:16 pm
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/still-in-the-fight-scars/
Full article and pictures and sketches on web page above.
Michael D. FayLance Cpl. William “Kyle� Carpenter.
Before leaving McGuire Veterans Administration Hospital, after our first day of sketching
two battle wounded Marines, Richard Johnson and I go by the Wounded Warrior Detachment
office and thank Gunnery Sgt. Alain Frederique for setting everything up for us. The
“gunny� says there’s another Marine who would really love to participate, Lance Cpl.
William “Kyle� Carpenter. It’s pretty late in the day, and we ask if we can set up a
time to meet and draw him tomorrow. The Gunny tells us no — Carpenter will be at Walter
Reed all of the next day for medical appointments. Carpenter’s face was virtually blown
off and his right arm shattered by a grenade blast and after no less than 30 surgeries in
nine weeks, he wants to tell his story. We don’t want to miss this opportunity.
We find Lance Corporal Carpenter relaxing on his hospital room’s La-Z Boy lounger. His
still-boyish face is a crazy quilt of scars. Kyle, as he prefers to be called, is resting
his heavily bandaged right arm on a pillow across his lap. Both upper thighs are bandaged,
and his right eye is a milky ghost of its former self.
Sitting on the bed closest to him is girlfriend Jordan Gleaton. Like Kyle, she’s a South
Carolina native. Jordan is taking a leave of absence from college and has barely left his
side since he returned to the States. The protocols for severely wounded Marines allow
them to have, at government expense, three people with them during their entire recovery.
Kyle chooses Jordan, and she lives with him, sleeping on the other bed in the room. The
hospital staff credits her presence, along with Kyle’s strong will, to explain his near
miraculous healing.
Michael D. FayLance Cpl. William “Kyle� Carpenter with his girlfriend, Jordan
Gleaton.
Kyle was wounded on November 21, 2010. His 12-man squad was detailed with setting up a new
patrol base in support of Patrol Base Beatley. Moving south from the patrol base lay a
series of villages the Marines had named, Shady, Shadier and Shadiest. For the past two
months theirs was the most violent area of operation associated with the restive city of
Marja.
Kyle’s squad exited Beatley bent over under the weight of full battle packs loaded with
food, water, ammunition and sandbags. The Taliban knew they were headed out on more than a
routine foot patrol. These Marines were intent on carving out a new foothold deeper into
the Talib’s turf.
An Afghan family had already been paid for their mud-walled compound and moved out.
Kyle’s squad took quick possession of it and started building sandbagged posts at the
three most strategic corners. The Taliban responded immediately with 25 minutes of sniper
fire. The first post was completed, only to be destroyed by an incoming 107-millimeter
ChiCom rocket. With nightfall came grenades over the walls and they took their first
casualty; Lance Cpl. Bradley Skipper. For the next two hours the Marines were fully
engaged with the Taliban.
Kyle and his best friend, Lance Cpl. Nicky Eufrazio, were fighting side by side in a half
completed sandbagged position, when a grenade landed. Like Huffman and Stinson, he
remembers everything, and tells it: There was a loud bang and everything went white. Lance
Cpl. Jarrod Lilly got to them first. He remembers two things, feeling blood everywhere and
Lilly gasping “Oh my God.� He then blacked out.
Kyle had taken 99 percent of the blast. His jaw had been blown off and lay against his
shoulder, but somehow still attached. Most of his teeth were gone. Ironically, although
his body had absorbed almost the entire explosion, his buddy Nicky was faring much worse.
A couple tiny slivers of shrapnel had managed to snake by, and were lodged in Nicky’s
brain. Even in the midst of his own horrific wounds and painful recovery, Kyle feels
guilty for not having absorbed 100 percent of the blast.
Back in the States, Kyle and Nicky would be roomies at the Naval Hospital at Bethesda, Md.
While Kyle healed more and more each day, his buddy stayed mired in a deep fog from the
brain damage. Kyle’s face would never be the same again, but Nicky would never be Nicky
again. Five weeks after arriving at Bethesda, the last member of their original fire team,
Lance Cpl. Charles Stinger, joined them after stepping on a land mine.
Sketching Kyle, I can’t help but noticing his jagged facial scars are almost black,
rather than the red welts I’ve seen and drawn from other wounded Marines. I ask him if
these dark lightning streaks across his face could be eventually lasered away. Kyle
laughs: they’re black because the powder from the grenade blast is literally tattooed
into the skin. Lasering is not an option; his scars would ignite. However, there is good
news, the doctors assure him his body will eventually absorb the chemicals and the scars
will fade. I watch Jordan looking at him. The love is palpable. She is oblivious to his
disfigurements.
Michael D. FayLance Cpl. William “Kyle� Carpenter.
Like Huffman and Stinson earlier in the day, Kyle is grateful to be alive, feeling guilty
for not being back in the field fighting with his unit, and amazed at the medical miracles
he’s received. He and Jordan are excited about his soon-to-arrive eye prosthesis.
“Hand painted�, they say, “it’ll be identical to the good eye, and there’s
enough muscles in the socket to allow it to move naturally.�
As Richard and I take our leave, Kyle stands up, shakes our hands, and after thanking us
for coming by, goes over and holds Jordan’s hands. “This is what we do,� Jordan
says. I can’t help but think of the doomed lovers, Tristan and Iseult, afloat in their
little boat in a great sea of uncertainty. I hope their love, so clear and pure in this
hospital room, will survive their eventual landfall in the real world.
Michael D. Fay held the the position of combat artist for the United States Marine Corps
from 2000 through January 2010. He was deployed several times to Iraq and Afghanistan, and
is the author of the 2010 Home Fires series “Drawing Fire.� His blog is Fire and Ice.