Marines to Probe Soldiers' Drownings

[thedrifter]

Mar 31, 2:41 PM EST

Marines to Probe Soldiers' Drownings




DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) -- Two senior Marine officers will investigate the deaths of two soldiers who drowned while trying to cross a canal in southeast Iraq, a spokesman said.

Sgt. Bradley Korthaus, 28, of Davenport, and Cpl. Evan James, 20, of La Harpe, Ill., died March 24 after disappearing in the Saddam Canal.

Two lieutenant colonels have been assigned to investigate the incident, said 1st Sgt. Michael Berg, a Marine spokesman from Peoria, Ill., where the 6th Engineer Support Battalion Company is based.

The investigation will involve interviews with Marines who were part of the mission and officers who gave commands, said Maj. Carolyn Dysart, spokeswoman for the Marine Forces Reserve in New Orleans.

Korthaus' fiancee, Barbi Schneckloth, 30, has questioned the company leader's handling of the canal crossing. She said she got a letter from Korthaus earlier saying the company's morale was suffering due to the career ambitions of its commander, Maj. Michael McCarthy.

Berg said he hasn't heard reports from the troops that morale is as poor as Schneckloth said Korthaus described.

Marilyn Korthaus said she'll let the Marines determine what happened to her son.

"We are not going to pursue anything," she said. "The Marine Corps will investigate and fix any problems. They will come through."

Donna James said her son was a strong swimmer but complained of fatigue and dehydration in letters earlier this month. She wonders whether that could have contributed to the drowning.

She added that she is not critical of the military and is awaiting results of the Marine investigation.


Sempers,

Roger

[thedrifter]

March 30, 2003

Crew drowns as Abrams plunges into Euphrates

By C. Mark Brinkley
Times staff writer



NEAR NASSIRIYAH, Iraq (March 30) - They are still kings of the battlefield, these 60-ton Abrams tanks, and until last week they were thought invincible.
No enemy fire had ever destroyed one, and no crew member had ever died fighting from one. But last week two Army tanks were destroyed by enemy fire and although those crew members survived, a crew has now died in an Abrams during combat.

Sunday, Marine tankers had a break in the non-stop push north into Iraq and it gave them a chance to think about four friends, Marines who drowned in an Abrams tank when it drove off a bridge into the Euphrates River near Nasiriyah Friday night.

(A few hours later, another Marine drowned when the Humvee he was riding in rolled over into a canal in South-Central Iraq, according to U.S. Central Command.)

The M1A1 Abrams tank was part of 2nd Platoon, Charlie Company, 1st Tank Battalion, based at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif. The battalion is serving with Regimental Combat Team 7, one of four infantry regiments under the control of I Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq. Other tankers involved in that night mission said it happened after the unit moved on to a bridge and was told to stop and get some sleep. Later, they were ordered to hurry up, get awake and get moving. These Marines believe the crew got lost in the dust kicked up by other tanks and simply drove off the side.

"We don't know exactly what happened," said Lance Cpl. Mark Rech, 20, a tank driver from Des Moines, Iowa. "We don't know if they were still sleepy or what."

Rech and the other Marines from his tank, nicknamed "Ring of Fire" in black paint on the main cannon, were friends with the fallen tank crew.

"For a while there, some of those guys were in our platoon," said Cpl. Brandon Carlson, 23, a tank gunner from Orlando, Fla. "We all knew each other."

And so the healing begins, as much as is possible here in the fertile crescent, where the tanks and their nearly impenetrable depleted-uranium hulls are leading most of the charges into battle.

"There's nothing we can do, not out here," Rech said. "I know that they wouldn't want us to be grieving. It's sad."

The other crewmembers shake their heads in agreement, then Rech looks up from the ground.

"It's very sad. Sad for their families," Rech said. "I mean, your good friend, he's gone now."

It had been smooth sailing for the members of 1st Tanks since the war kicked off with them storming through the Iraqi border town of Safwan, though in the early fog of combat, a Marine AH-1W Super Cobra attack helicopter accidentally targeted a sister tank from Alpha Company, launching a Hellfire missile that rendered the tank useless.

But all four crewmembers survived that blast, with one Marine receiving shrapnel wounds that aren't life threatening. The Abrams is built for such attacks, though the river accident is a worst nightmare.

"We're doing all right. I guess, in a way, you can expect things to happen," Carlson said. "It's not going to happen much."

Quite the contrary, most of the memories these Marines are taking away from the war are of Iraqi soldiers surrendering instead of fighting.

"As soon as they see tanks, or hear us, they're gone," Rech said.

Near Basra, an Iraqi general, colonel and lieutenant colonel all gave up to members of Charlie Company.

"They were calm," Rech said. "They wanted to surrender....I didn't expect them to be that compliant, to just come up and surrender."

The closest call the "Ring of Fire" had was also near Basra, they said, when two rocket-propelled grenades missed the tank by about 50 yards. Another tank was hit later, but the round only damaged the treads.

"We're fine," said Lance Cpl. Jesse Ibarra, 20, a loader from Gregory-Portland, Texas. "This is the safest thing out here."


Sempers,

Roger