Just some Pictures from Deployment

[LeftyCharette]

Thought maybe some of you would like to see these pictures. I have many, but havent uploaded much yet.

Dam Security Unit 3, part of RCT-7 in Haditha, Iraq

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[LeftyCharette]

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/surconthemove.jpg

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[LeftyCharette]

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/28.jpg

[LeftyCharette]

Needless to say, my tour didnt last too long. A bullet in and out my neck and a bullet through the hand. Here are some pictures taken stateside.

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/9.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/meandcommandanthagee.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/File0002.jpg

[LeftyCharette]

These next pictures may be disturbing to some. Taken Oct 31, 2006. 2 days after I woke up out of coma and the day I got stateside at Bethesda naval medical center in ICU.

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[LeftyCharette]

Dont want to end on a bad note. The last 2 were part of a set Jackie and I did for Christmas.

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/File0003.jpg

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[LeftyCharette]

Something I wrote on my myspace blog this week.

I just want to say that Dam Security Unit 3( B Co. 4th LAR) attached to RCT-7 and based out of Haditha, Iraq has come home. We left with 110 and 110 made it home. There was only one casualty...me, go figure. Took a bullet to the hand(amputated thumb) and a bullet in and out the neck( paralysis of left arm) but I sit here today because my fellow Marines and Sailors took care of me. Don't ever give a corpsman ****, because he will save your life.

We patrolled the Euphrates river in the Anbar province as far north as the Syrian border and as far south as Ramadi. We used SURC boats provided to us by Small Craft Company, 2D AA BN. 2D AA did an outstanding job training our LAV crewmen to become captains, coxswains, and gunners on our boats. Our 0311 scouts also had great training prior to deployment and had great success finding cache's, identifying IED's, detaining EPW's, and performed outstandingly well through multiple firefights weekly while patrolling the waterways.

Even though I was wounded in an ambush, once I heal up I am more than willing to go back over. Good things are happening out there. The US has effectively lassoed Anbar province and the fighting there has slowed greatly. In Haditha there were many engagements daily, but now there is usually only 1-2 attacks a week now. The US, IA's and IP's have made it very difficult for insurgents to operate in the cities and our DSU Marines made it just as difficult to traffic weapons, drugs, money, and men on the waterways that connect all the cities in Al Anbar.

Thank you RCT-7 for utilizing the talent of the DSU Marines. Thank you to 2D AA BN and Special Missions Training Center for the great training prior to our deployment. Cpl Mignoli and Sgt White, you guys were awesome. Sgt Smotherman, thanks for coming over with us, you are a natural born leader. Thank you to Cpl Artuso and Doc Schumacher for saving my life and thank you to the Army helo pilots that medevaced me Oct 23, 2006. I dont know your names but I will never forget you. Thank you to all the medical teams that took care of me in Balad, Landstuhl, and Bethesda. Thank you to all the people that still support our troops. Please dont pull us out until we are done helping the Iraqi's. Give it time, good things are happening over there. Thank you Tony for being an awesome roommate at Bethesda, hope you are recovering well.

Thank you Marine Corps for giving me the adventure of my life while fighting in Iraq. Thank you insurgents, militant muslims, Iran and anyone else supporting chaos in the rebuilding of Iraq. Without you I wouldn't have anyone to shoot. I hope you all either assimilate or die.

Semper Fi,
Lcpl Chris Charette

[yellowwing]

I'm glad you and your team made it back. Now heal up and get ready to kick some more ass!

[GySgtRet]

Thank you for your service and for coming back home. Words are not enough to thank you. I am very glad that you and the crew you were with have made it back stateside. I hope that you have a rapid recovery.

Semper Fi

[thedrifter]

Thank You for Your Service!

Prayers are with you to have a speedy recovery.

God Bless!
Ellie

[YLDNDN6]

Wow...I am in awe of your positive attitude. Keep up the good fight brother! Welcome back, Marine!

[maverickmarine]

Yeah, I have to echo what the other Marines have said, thank you for your service. Your attitude is outstanding. Here's to a speedy recovery.

[sgt tony]

Thank You very much Marine and god speed on the recovery.

Semper Fi and Carry on

[skyhawker]

Thanks for your service Marine, glad you all came home. Speedy recovery.
Semper fi and carry on .

[marinegreen]

Something I wrote on my myspace blog this week.

I just want to say that Dam Security Unit 3( B Co. 4th LAR) attached to RCT-7 and based out of Haditha, Iraq has come home. We left with 110 and 110 made it home. There was only one casualty...me, go figure. Took a bullet to the hand(amputated thumb) and a bullet in and out the neck( paralysis of left arm) but I sit here today because my fellow Marines and Sailors took care of me. Don't ever give a corpsman ****, because he will save your life.

We patrolled the Euphrates river in the Anbar province as far north as the Syrian border and as far south as Ramadi. We used SURC boats provided to us by Small Craft Company, 2D AA BN. 2D AA did an outstanding job training our LAV crewmen to become captains, coxswains, and gunners on our boats. Our 0311 scouts also had great training prior to deployment and had great success finding cache's, identifying IED's, detaining EPW's, and performed outstandingly well through multiple firefights weekly while patrolling the waterways.

Even though I was wounded in an ambush, once I heal up I am more than willing to go back over. Good things are happening out there. The US has effectively lassoed Anbar province and the fighting there has slowed greatly. In Haditha there were many engagements daily, but now there is usually only 1-2 attacks a week now. The US, IA's and IP's have made it very difficult for insurgents to operate in the cities and our DSU Marines made it just as difficult to traffic weapons, drugs, money, and men on the waterways that connect all the cities in Al Anbar.

Thank you RCT-7 for utilizing the talent of the DSU Marines. Thank you to 2D AA BN and Special Missions Training Center for the great training prior to our deployment. Cpl Mignoli and Sgt White, you guys were awesome. Sgt Smotherman, thanks for coming over with us, you are a natural born leader. Thank you to Cpl Artuso and Doc Schumacher for saving my life and thank you to the Army helo pilots that medevaced me Oct 23, 2006. I dont know your names but I will never forget you. Thank you to all the medical teams that took care of me in Balad, Landstuhl, and Bethesda. Thank you to all the people that still support our troops. Please dont pull us out until we are done helping the Iraqi's. Give it time, good things are happening over there. Thank you Tony for being an awesome roommate at Bethesda, hope you are recovering well.

Thank you Marine Corps for giving me the adventure of my life while fighting in Iraq. Thank you insurgents, militant muslims, Iran and anyone else supporting chaos in the rebuilding of Iraq. Without you I wouldn't have anyone to shoot. I hope you all either assimilate or die.

Semper Fi,
Lcpl Chris Charette

YOU ROCK MARINE !! You make us proud to call you a Brother Marine:yes:
Wishing you a speedy recovery and nutten but the best in life:thumbup:

MG

[jinelson]

God bless you and all your team.

[outlaw3179]

Semper Fi Marine. Good ****.

[ggyoung]

Welcome home MARINE S/F

[OLE SARG]

God speed Marine and welsome home. I've got a Grandson in Fellejua (sp) and we too worry about him!!!!

SEMPER FI,

[jnthnfitch]

we thank you for what you do.good luck to you and your family.

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[BigPhil]

Thank YouMarine for giving your all, God's speed on your recovery.

Semper Fi.

[Sgt Leprechaun]

Semper Fi bro. Great pics.

I assume the big foam thingie in some of those 'early recovery' shots is to keep you from tearing out sutures and whatnot? I've never seen one used before, is that a 'field expediant' or something made specifically for that?

[FistFu68]

:usmc: WELCOME HOME MARINE :usmc:

[RON 68]

Chris you have done enough for the u.s.a. and the corps and made it back alive.enjoy the rest of your long life.stay healthy,
Semper-Fi. RON 68

[jetdawgg]

Thank you Jarhead:usmc:

How about un update if possible

[CplCrotty]

Thank you Chris. This is an outstanding post.

[Apache]

Semper Fi Marine
Again,thanks for your service,God bless,and welcome back to "the world"
SSG Gehri

[Roger Shepherd]

Think You for your time that you put in for the Marine Corp. Think You MARINE

[Mytcbra96]

:usmc: :usmc: Thanks so much, you make us all proud! Semper Fi :flag:

[LeftyCharette]

Just an update a little more than a year since my injury.

I am still on active duty serving with B Co 4th LAR BN I&I staff. Its a basic mon-fri office job. My paralyzed arm has healed about 50% and I now have a prosthetic for my amputated thumb. I was just put on my 3rd limited duty board and am still not fit for full duty. My doctors say it will be another 1-2 years to maximize my recovery. I'm unsure at this time what the Marine Corps will do with me. I've got 4 1/2 years of good service under my belt but at this time I just want to go back to college and move on with my life. My intentions before Iraq were to go to OCS upon return from Iraq, but now with my injuries the OSO says that they won't be able to accept me. So I feel I should try something different from the Marine Corps. I want to get an MBA in Economics and find myself a cushy office job. Well, thats about all I have going on.

-Chris

[LeftyCharette]

Believe it or not, a year later and I still havent uploaded all my pictures and videos. Here are a few more pictures that I do have though.



The day before we flew out, we had our celebratory cigars. I'm in the green polo shirt.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/predeploymentcigars.jpg

Marines of DSU3 3rd PLT stop for a picture with an Azerbaijani soldier. We called him Jaws because all his teeth were silver like the guy from James Bond. Our base was split in half, Marines and Azerbaijani's on one side and US Army and Iraqi Army on the other.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/ChrisandCrew-1.jpg

My amazing platoon commander CWO Wirtanen on patrol through Haditha. He took great care of all of us and we would follow him anywhere.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/cwo3wirtanenplatooncmdr.jpg

I have a few more, but photobucket is having issues. I'll come back tomorrow and post them.

[gwladgarwr]

Thank you insurgents, militant Muslims, Iran and anyone else supporting chaos in the rebuilding of Iraq. Without you I wouldn't have anyone to shoot. I hope you all either assimilate or die.

Semper Fi,
Lcpl Chris Charette

Aww, spoken humbly like a true Marine. Maybe you should try driving Rt 28 in Northern Virginia when it rains and you'd have PLENTY to shoot.:scared:

Glad to see you're healing up fast. Get better so you can shoot some more trash. And Welcome Home, Marine.

You had to BE the one in a green polo, huh? We're all of a sudden an individual, right? :bunny:

Sgt gw:iwo:

[LeftyCharette]

Aww, spoken humbly like a true Marine. Maybe you should try driving Rt 28 in Northern Virginia when it rains and you'd have PLENTY to shoot.:scared:

Glad to see you're healing up fast. Get better so you can shoot some more trash. And Welcome Home, Marine.

You had to BE the one in a green polo, huh? We're all of a sudden an individual, right? :bunny:

Sgt gw:iwo:

Where in NOVA do you live? I'm in Leesburg. I see you are with Delta Co.,
are you deploying to Iraq this coming spring with them?

[LeftyCharette]

More pics.

Flood gates of the dam at night.

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/damnight.jpg

Are we close to home? We were attached to 2/3, hence the hawaii reference.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/attheCoC.jpg

Our beachfront property. This is what I woke up to in the morning. Truly beautiful. I liked living on a beach in Iraq.
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[LeftyCharette]

My boat crew.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/sgtsantorocplcheshire.jpg

Haditha city.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/hadithacity.jpg

On the dam at sunset.
http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c284/nx2k/sunsetdam.jpg

[gwladgarwr]

Where in NOVA do you live? I'm in Leesburg. I see you are with Delta Co.,
are you deploying to Iraq this coming spring with them?

I'm right over in Manassas. I used to drive up 28 South to Aden Road and get into Upshur from MCB-8, but they closed the back gate to Upshur after 9/11 (and then totally closed off MCB-8 to all civilian traffic.)

Looks like I'm missing the party with Dirty Delta. I dropped to IRR in July, right after we got back from AT in Australia (best time I ever had with Delta) but I've been trying to lat move even before July. If it works out, I'll go to uptraining in Feb-Mar, and most likely deploy in June, but not with LAR. Delta just got called up this past Monday. Hope they get some new vehicles - ours were OK but really old! Hated working on the ATs and the hard-to-fix hammer heads. The easiest ones to fix were the mortards (no fancy bling on them except the interior mortard platform.) Still doing Toys For Tots for them this year (including tonight and tomorrow morning.)

You did know about the the little event Kirkpatrick's puts on for some the wounded warriors at his pub/restaurant in Haymarket, right? The last one was a few weeks ago and is always a good time. You'll see mention of a "warriors' nite" here on this site and his site at http://www.kirkpatricks.tv/

Good that you're at NOVA. I did NOVA for one semester; now at Mason. Hit me up sometime.

Sgt gw:flag:

[Dave Coup]

This old Marine thanks you from the bottom of my heart. Keep healing,good luck with your future. I'm sure that with your attitide you'll go far. God Bless and Semper Fidelis

Dave

[Riven37]

Thank you for your service when I was unable to fight again.

Semper Fi

Welcome to the brotherhood :usmc: :flag:

[recon532002]

Wish I could have been there with you all Hero's every one of you

SEMPER FI RECON

[Wiggles]

Thanks Marine. Keep us updated.

I used to live in Woodbridge for a while, and worked in Chantilly... Keep making us proud.

[Gunner 0313]

My boat crew.


Haditha city.


On the dam at sunset.



:flag: Surfing around in the forums and came across your thread. Hope all is well with you and you're back up to speed brother.

Semper Fi

[Crowe0311]

Great story, I hope you continue to improve and get better.

[GEOCO]

I look up to Marines like you. I pray you make a full recovery.

[Lupo22]

Great story, great pictures! I hope all is well with you and your healing. I wish you only the best in life and, as a civilian, thank you from the bottom of my heart! I hope one day very shortly to call you a brother. S/F and God Bless

[NewHarleyGear]

Semper Fi brother! Thanks for your service and God bless.

[wpkam78]

Thank you for sharing!

[MontezumaCpl]

Wow, just found this thread! Best wishes Chris! hope all is well!

Semper Fi Brother!

[doc h fmf]

godbless you my brothert take care.

SEMPER FI

[ksilvia]

thanks for your service hope all is well and i'm sure we all would like to hear an update from you are you still in the Marine corps

[IDontWheeze]

I'm sure I'm not supposed to post here, but I feel theat if I have to break some rules to thank you - well I will.

My family safely sleeps at night because Marines and servicemembers like you are willing to put it all on the line and take the fight to the terrorists instead of the letting the terrorists bring the fight to the homefront. Thank you for your brave service, your dedication, and your sacrifices.

I can assure you that, with your positive outlook and selfless dedication, you will succeed in whatever endeavors you decide to take on in your life after the Marine Corps.

I hope you are still doing well, and I wish you, your family, and all the Marines a Merry Christmas.

God Bless

[Rocky C]

Thank you My Brother for your Service and Sacrifice and for sharing all with us.
God Bless.

Semper Fi,
Rocky

[CCHAPL]

Thank you sir, It is much appreciated!

[HOLM]

Thank you for all that you have given...


And what awesome Pictures?? What were you taking those photos with?


Semper Fi!

[dROD20]

Wow, you are an inspration to young Marines like myself...well hell, you are an inspration to ALL Americans. Thank you for your sacrifices and your attitude. I wish you a quick recovery...you will be in my prayers.

SEMPER FIDELIS

[foreverproud]

I do not have words enough to say "Thank you, Lcpl. Charette."

God speed and the very best to you always!

[Komenko]

I was at Haditha Dam during the summer of 2006 taking care of the IED craters and IEDs we came across. Was a pain in the ass going up the stairs just to get to the chow hall! Stayed next to the contractors at the bottom of the Dam with all our gear before rolling out at night for ECR Missions on the main highway near by. All I can say is that you and your crew did an awsome job taking care of that place. if the bad guys got it everything down stream would have been done! S/F Well Done Marine!

[sfthog]

God bless you and your family. Thank You.

[ODGreen]

Your sacrifice is greatly appreciated.

We will do our best to make all those who have sacrificed in defense of their county proud to call themselves Marines.

[Big Jim]

WELCOME HOME, MARINE...SEMPER FI.....!!!
:usmc::thumbup:

[Laurens]

The pictures are not disturbing.. They're the truth.. A truth many people and many Americans don't want to know. The US is making progress in those countries, but at what cost?

You are someone I look up to, because you have enlisted, because you deployed to a war zone, because you were (/are?) wounded & because you're bad ass and honest enough to share it with the world. I hope you'll fully recover and have lots of time to enjoy life in peace.

[DrZ]

Chris,
It is Marines like you who make me know that nothing has changed since my time.
Thank you for your service Marine.

Focus on what you want in life and go after it with the same drive and motivation you have shown both here and overseas.

Welcome home my brother.... Job Well done.