President Barack Obama walks with Col. Mark Camerer, the 436th Airlift Wing commander, as he arrives at Dover Air Force Base on Tuesday to meet with the families of the service members who died in a helicopter crash. / GETTY IMAGES/AFP/JIM WATSON
Aug. 10, 2011 - An elite Navy SEAL team, an Air Force para-rescue medic, an Army combat helicopter crew, a pair of Marine infantry sergeants.
The mostly unidentified remains of men from every major service were flown to Dover Air Force Base on Tuesday, 32 of the latest casualties of fighting in rugged and mountainous Afghanistan, and some of the 6,183 military casualties of post-9/11 warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan that will soon slog into its second decade.
President Barack Obama and top leaders of the Defense Department and military led the midday ceremony honoring the 30 troops killed when a rocket-propelled grenade slammed into their helicopter after they flew in to assist ground troops fighting in Afghanistan's Wardak province on Saturday.
For the two Marines, a later and smaller, but no less solemn, reception followed Tuesday night, followed by transfer to the mortuary at Dover, the U.S. military's largest.
"Our hometown lost a wonderful young man, Spencer Duncan. He was a door gunner on that helicopter," Judy Carter, an Olathe, Kan., resident, said in an email on Tuesday. "He was a friend of my daughter's and loved by many."
Hundreds of other family members, friends and military colleagues from around the nation made the trip to Dover on Tuesday, arriving by car, bus or chartered aircraft. At one point, the group spent about 70 minutes with President Obama after he arrived and briefly paid his respects aboard both C-17 jet transports that bore the helicopter crash victims to Dover. read more>>>
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
President pays his respects at DAFB
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