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Marine
Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch, lying on top of his tank, covers
his face after being wounded during an April 7, 2004, battle
in Fallujah, Iraq.
| Date
published: 4/11/2006 |
By
CHELSEA J. CARTER
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS |
April Popaditch
froze for a minute when the phone rang. It was the middle of
the night on the day before her anniversary, and she had been
uneasy all day. She knew something was not right with her husband,
who was in Iraq. But she couldn't quite put her finger on the
feeling.
She
was on vacation with her 10-year-old son, Nicholas, in the resort
town of Big Bear, several hours from their home at the Marine
Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif.
April
should have been wondering what Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch
would surprise her with on April 8, 2004--her 13th wedding anniversary.
The year before, it was a front-page newspaper picture of Nick
smoking a cigar with statue of Saddam Hussein in the background--a
picture that came to symbolize the fall of Baghdad. The media
dubbed him the Cigar Marine.
On
this anniversary, Nick Popaditch would be making headlines again.
The
caller began to speak. "We regret to inform you that
your husband has been wounded"
A
casualty of battle
Days
after four Americans were killed, their bodies mutilated and
two of them hung from a bridge in Fallujah, Nick and his tank
crew rolled into the city as part of an operation to quell the
violence.
To
say she was unhappy when Nick volunteered to go to Iraq for
a second tour would be putting it nicely. As a Marine wife,
she knew and understood that a Marine goes when he's called.
But volunteering?
For
Nick, there was no choice. Since he joined the Marines at age
18, this was what he had trained for. And it was his job when
word came through the lines in Fallujah that a patrol unit had
been ambushed. Nick and his crew "fired up"
the tank and rolled into the city.
What
he noticed, though, was the willingness of the insurgents to
fight the U.S. Marines--even those in a tank--head-on.
The
fighting was moving from street to street. During a running
gun battle, Nick's tank turned down a street that narrowed,
making it impossible to move the tank's gun turret. Manning
the machine gun, Nick heard a roar from a nearby rooftop. A
rocket hit the turret. Then another hit the hatch.
Nick
heard it before he felt it--a hiss, then a dull throb. His helmet
blown off, Nick fell through the hatch to the floor of the tank.
He
struggled to get to his feet. He couldn't see. He was blind.
He reached up and felt something warm and wet on his face.
We
have to get this tank moving, he thought to himself. Then he
said it out loud.
Nick
managed to stand up, grabbing onto something inside the tank.
He shouted orders to his crew. But nobody answered. It took
him a minute to realize the RPG explosion had made him deaf
in both ears.
Nick
suddenly felt the tank move. Now, as his crew battled to get
him and themselves to safety, he focused solely on trying to
survive.
He
was overcome by nausea. He was suddenly tired. He told himself:
Don't go to sleep.
Absorbing
the shock
Wounded?
What does that mean? April's mind reeled. It took her a minute
to grasp the news: Her husband, a tank commander, had been hit
in the head by an RPG.
Just
bring him home to me, she prayed. She didn't think the other
thoughts, the ones that reveal the depth of fear: How bad was
it? What would their life be like?
Those
questions would come later.
Part
1: Marine's Celebration Cigar Had Dual
Meaning
Part
2: 'We regret to inform you'
Part
3: Coming Home To Uncertainty
Part
4: Wounded War Vet Starts Life Anew
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