Sunday - November 22, 2009

THE LUCKIEST SOLDIER ALIVE ….. MUST READ AND SEE …

Boy, do I feel like a wuss complaining about my insignificant little nothing cold .....

The Lt. mistakingly says Nov. 26 in the video.  But the actual date is Oct. 26.

British Army officer, Lieutenant Paddy Rice, has been described as “the luckiest soldier in Afghanistan” after surviving being shot by a Taliban sniper.


By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent, Nad e’Ali, Afghanistan
Published: 6:30AM GMT 22 Nov 2009

Lieutenant Paddy Rice of the 1st battalion Grenadier Guards was wounded in the back and neck while on duty in central Helmand.

The bullet struck the officer just beneath his left shoulder blade, then travelled inside his back and up to his neck, where it left his body, passed his right ear before blasting a hole through his helmet.

After being injured, Lt Rice, who was serving with the battalion’s Inkerman Company, was flown by a Medical Emergency Response Team Chinook helicopter from his base to Camp Bastion, where his wounds were cleaned and left open for three days before being stitched under general anaesthetic.

The 25-year-old Guard’s Officer was offered the chance of recuperating from his wound in the UK but refused and is now back serving with his platoon on the front line in the Nad e’Ali area of central Helmand.

The drama unfolded on the afternoon of October 26th, while Lt Rice was on the roof of British base known as Compound 23 in the Chah-e’Anjir area of central Helmand.

The soldier was dressed in his body armour and helmet and was in a kneeling position when he was spotted by a Taliban fighter who opened fire through a “murder hole” – in a mud wall.

He said: “I climbed on to the roof of the Compound 23, where my soldiers and I were based, and was trying to move a radio into a sangar (defensive bunker). It was an exposed position so I was wearing my body armour and helmet. I then felt a thump in the back of my back, as though I had been kicked, and I knew immediately I had been shot.”

The bullet passed through his body, slicing open Lt Rice’s back and leaving an eight inch long gash running diagonally from his shoulder blade to an area just beneath his skull.

He continued: “I put my hand up to the back of my head and I could see blood and I think I said something to my platoon sergeant, Gert Botha, such as “I’ve been shot”.

“I was helped down from the roof and I radioed company headquarters, gave contact report (a message informing others that there has been an enemy attack), and said “there is one casualty and it’s me – I’ve been shot”. I wasn’t panicking I had considered how I might react if I was shot or injured but because everything seemed to be functioning normally I think I realised I would be OK.

“I know that I was very lucky to escape with what is actually a flesh wound, albeit a nasty one. If I had been looking up the bullet would have hit the back of my head and that would have been a different story.”

Compound 23 is one of several locations which surround Patrol Base Shahzad, the main British base in Chah-e’Anjir. The base and the satellite locations provide a security bubble around the district centre, which allows Afghans to trade in the bazaar and children to go to school without fear of intimidation by the Taliban.

But while the Afghans can carry on with their lives without interference, the British compounds are being attacked virtually every day by insurgents.

On arriving at the base where Lt Rice had been shot, medics were surprised at the calmness shown by the officer, who was sitting down smoking a cigarette when they arrived at his base.

An hour after being shot, Lt Rice was able to contact his father and give him the news. He continued: “It was quite a surreal telephone call. But it was far better that I told him that I had been shot in the neck and was OK rather than someone else.”

Lt Rice was flown back to Camp Bastion, the main British base in Helmand, where he was given further medical treatment and three days after being injured, he received 29 stitches.

The officer also called his girlfriend in Clapham, south west London, who was shopping in a supermarket when he broke the news.

Lt Rice added: “She was a bit upset and startled to hear me saying that I had been shot while she was buying her supper but after I reassured her that I was fine she relaxed a bit. She knows that this is the job I want to do, she has known that since we met – she is very understanding.”

Captain James Swanston, the second-in-command of Inkerman Company, Grenadier Guards, who was in charge of the operations room at the time of the attack said that if the bullet had been a millimetre either side of where it struck Lt Rice would have either been killed or seriously injured.

He said: “When you hear that someone has been shot you expect the worst. But when the medics arrived, Paddy was sitting down smoking a cigarette. He showed great calmness.”

IN HIS OWN WORDS

Posted by peiper     on 11/22/2009 at 04:45 AM   
Filed Under: • Battling Brits • Military • UK • War-Stories •  
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