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thedrifter
09-15-06, 07:55 AM
Marine hurt in civilian job getting help from comrades
Friday, September 15, 2006
Grant Segall
Plain Dealer Reporter

Marine Sgt. Jason Meadows weathered the bombs of Iraq just fine.

Then he was burned and nearly blinded by a blast at his civilian job.

In the hospital, Meadows coughed up hardened bits of molten magnesium. A visiting comrade, Staff Sgt. Dan Priestley, said, "It's a good thing you didn't blow your nose. It would have given me more shrapnel!"

After the explosion, Meadows' first thought was, "My wife's pregnant, and I'm never going to see what my baby looks like."

Now his left eye is clearing up, and he hopes for a good view in four months when his wife, WGAR co-host Laurie Hovater Meadows, gives birth to their first child.

With help from the Leathernecks - a motorcycle club for former Marines - and others, the Priestley family is staging a fund-raiser at Jimmy J's bar Saturday afternoon to cover some 21st-century medicine for the Meadowses: storing the baby's umbilical cord for possible use in Jason's treatment.

It's a turnabout. The Meadowses had staged a fund-raiser at Jimmy J's last year for Priestley, whose legs were riddled in Iraq.

"It's definitely time for me to give back," says Priestley.

The two Marines belong to the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment, the Brook Park reserve unit that endured one of Iraq's bloodiest tours, losing 48 men in seven months last year.

In January, Meadows went back to his old job at Air Craft Wheels, an Avon foundry. Soon he started big renovations at home for the baby.

On the hot morning of Aug. 1, he was setting magnesium ingots in a furnace as usual when the metal blew up, apparently from unnoticed moisture.

"Everything went white," he says.

Meadows spun away and flung off his safety glasses. But the magnesium had flown past them, coating his eyes and eyelids. Seventy to 80 percent of the corneas' surface was burned.

Calls about the accident were not returned by Air Craft or the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

During a week at MetroHealth Medical Center, Meadows' eyes were treated with stem cells and stitched shut to heal.

He has healed quickly enough to start watching blurry TV with his right eye. The left eye is still stitched mostly shut. The doctors are making no predictions about either.

The Meadowses are embarrassed about getting charity. But radio personalities earn money mostly through outside work, and Laurie won't have much time for it while taking care of a baby and a husband.

Marine and radio friends are helping to finish the couple's renovations. The fund-raiser will mainly pay to store the umbilicus, which workers' compensation does not cover.

Fund-raiser Saturday, 2 to 5 p.m., at Jimmy J's Midtown Bar & Grill, 1854 Snow Road, Parma, 216-351-9798. A $20 ticket includes food, beverage and country music from the Lawless band. Tickets at the door or from Lisa Priestley, 216-741-8318.

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:

gsegall@plaind.com, 216-999-4187

Ellie