thedrifter
05-03-06, 06:54 PM
22nd MEU home from Iraq combat tour
By Christian Lowe
Times staff writer
It was an action-packed deployment: two months in Iraq; a training stint in Africa; and port calls in France, Spain and Italy. But after nearly six months overseas, the Camp Lejeune, N.C.-based leathernecks of the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit are finally home.
Hand-painted “welcome home” signs, waving families and kisses greeted the 2,200 Marines on May 2 and 3 as they returned from the ships of Expeditionary Strike Group 8.
Leathernecks from Bravo and Charlie companies, 1st Battalion, 2nd Marines, marched past the expectant throng of well-wishers, with children jumping into the arms of their returning parents.
CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters thundered overhead as crews from Marine Corps Air Station New River, N.C.-based Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 261 — the MEU’s air-combat element — flew into their home base from the amphibious assault ship Nassau.
“I just want to see my wife and spend time with her,” said Sgt. Anthony Sanders, a squad leader with Bravo Company. “I’m glad to be home.”
MEU Marines served a two-month tour in Hit, Iraq, in January, sweeping the upper Euphrates River Valley for weapons caches and insurgent enclaves. The Marines lived alongside Iraqi army forces, helping train them for the counter-insurgency mission they will assume as U.S. forces are drawn down.
The MEU’s deployment was not without cost, however. Thirty-nine Marines were wounded; three were killed. Cpl. Orville Gerena, Lance Cpl. David S. Parr and Pfc. Jacob D. Spann were killed Feb. 6 when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb near their combat outpost in Hit.
During Bravo Company’s march into the homecoming celebration held in the 8th Marines’ gymnasium at Lejeune, the men snapped their heads to the right to honor one of the unit’s wounded, HM3 Elmer Dinglasan, who helped welcome his comrades home.
Dinglasan has been undergoing therapy in Washington, D.C., since mid-January after losing his legs in a mine blast during a night patrol in the desert north of Hit.
Ellie
By Christian Lowe
Times staff writer
It was an action-packed deployment: two months in Iraq; a training stint in Africa; and port calls in France, Spain and Italy. But after nearly six months overseas, the Camp Lejeune, N.C.-based leathernecks of the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit are finally home.
Hand-painted “welcome home” signs, waving families and kisses greeted the 2,200 Marines on May 2 and 3 as they returned from the ships of Expeditionary Strike Group 8.
Leathernecks from Bravo and Charlie companies, 1st Battalion, 2nd Marines, marched past the expectant throng of well-wishers, with children jumping into the arms of their returning parents.
CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters thundered overhead as crews from Marine Corps Air Station New River, N.C.-based Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 261 — the MEU’s air-combat element — flew into their home base from the amphibious assault ship Nassau.
“I just want to see my wife and spend time with her,” said Sgt. Anthony Sanders, a squad leader with Bravo Company. “I’m glad to be home.”
MEU Marines served a two-month tour in Hit, Iraq, in January, sweeping the upper Euphrates River Valley for weapons caches and insurgent enclaves. The Marines lived alongside Iraqi army forces, helping train them for the counter-insurgency mission they will assume as U.S. forces are drawn down.
The MEU’s deployment was not without cost, however. Thirty-nine Marines were wounded; three were killed. Cpl. Orville Gerena, Lance Cpl. David S. Parr and Pfc. Jacob D. Spann were killed Feb. 6 when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb near their combat outpost in Hit.
During Bravo Company’s march into the homecoming celebration held in the 8th Marines’ gymnasium at Lejeune, the men snapped their heads to the right to honor one of the unit’s wounded, HM3 Elmer Dinglasan, who helped welcome his comrades home.
Dinglasan has been undergoing therapy in Washington, D.C., since mid-January after losing his legs in a mine blast during a night patrol in the desert north of Hit.
Ellie