source GAIA package: Sx_MilitaryTimes_M6200710711230345_5675.zip Origin key: Sx_MilitaryTimes_M6200710711230345 imported at Fri Jan 8 18:18:01 2016
The convoy of six Humvees left Forward Operating Base Apache the afternoon of Dec. 4.
Their mission was to patrol the streets of Adhamiyah in northeast Baghdad and find a place to put a 250-kilowatt generator to provide electricity for more than 100 homes.
Shortly after they left their compound, the soldiers of 1st Platoon, Company C, 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment, turned off a major roadway and onto a side street. The street was lined on both sides with parked cars and two-story buildings.
As the convoy was stopped on the street, less than a mile from FOB Apache, an insurgent standing on a nearby rooftop threw a grenade into the last Humvee.
"Grenade!" yelled Spc. Ross McGinnis, who was manning the vehicle's M2 .50-caliber machine gun. McGinnis, facing backward because he was in the rear vehicle, tried to deflect the grenade, but it fell into the Humvee and lodged between the radios.
"Where?" yelled Sgt. 1st Class Cedric Thomas, 1st Platoon's platoon sergeant.
"The grenade is in the truck!" replied McGinnis, who was standing up and getting ready to jump out of the vehicle.
"McGinnis turned and looked down and realized no one in the truck knew where the grenade was," said Capt. Michael Baka, his company commander. "He knew everyone had their doors combat-locked and they wouldn't be able to get out."
Instead of jumping out of the truck to save his own life, like he had been trained to do, McGinnis threw his back against the radio mount, smothering the explosive with his body.
"I looked out of the corner of my eye as I was crouching down, and I saw him pin it down," Thomas said in a statement provided by Multi-National Division-Baghdad.
McGinnis had time to jump out of the truck, Thomas, 30, later told Marine Corps Times.
"When I think about it," Thomas said, "I just get shocked because he always said, 'Sergeant T, if a grenade fell in, I wouldn't know what I'd do.'"
The grenade exploded as soon as McGinnis covered it, said Baka, who was in the convoy's fourth Humvee.
The blast filled the vehicle with black smoke and debris and blew the driver's door and right passenger's door wide open, Thomas said. The machine gun was blown off its mount, and Thomas' door was thrown off its hinges.
The explosion hit McGinnis on his sides and his lower back, under his vest. He was killed instantly. The other four soldiers in the Humvee sustained relatively minor injuries.
For his heroic actions, McGinnis was nominated for a Medal of Honor, said Maj. Sean Ryan, a spokesman for 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. McGinnis' unit -- part of the 1st Infantry Division -- is attached to 2nd BCT while it's in Iraq.
Only two service members have been awarded the Medal of Honor since the beginning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: one Marine and one soldier.
On Dec. 11, McGinnis was approved for a Silver Star, the third-highest award for valor.
"[I]t was very clear to me that his acts were completely selfless on his part, and without him doing that, I probably would have had four soldiers in that platoon killed or seriously wounded," Baka said.
'Very young, very eager'
McGinnis, who shared his June 14 birthday with the Army, was 19 when he died.
A 2005 graduate of Keystone High School in Knox, Pa., a town of about 1,100 people, McGinnis enlisted in the fall of his senior year.
"I remember that he was very dedicated to completing his graduation requirements so that he could go on to basic training," said Vicky Walters, the school's principal and a longtime friend of the McGinnis family.
McGinnis had a lot of friends, Walters said.
"He was a fun-loving guy," she said. "He was always in good humor. He was always very respectful."
McGinnis arrived at Company C in October 2005, Baka said. Many soldiers from the Schweinfurt, Germany-based battalion had left the unit for new assignments or careers outside the Army, and McGinnis was part of a crop of new soldiers assigned to the unit.
"He was very eager to learn," Baka said. "He was only 18 years old when he arrived at the unit, very young, very eager."
Baka, 30, and his soldiers arrived in Iraq on Aug. 4 to help ease the sectarian violence that was tearing through Baghdad.
On the morning of Dec. 4, Baka signed a waiver that would allow him to promote McGinnis to specialist. The young soldier died later that day and was posthumously promoted to E-4.
It's not unusual for insurgents to throw grenades at his soldiers as they drive by, Baka said, but the explosives typically land outside the up-armored vehicles.
When the grenade exploded inside McGinnis' vehicle, Baka said, he knew right then what it was.
"This blast was very loud, and immediately following, there was gunfire," Baka said.
He instantly ordered his driver to turn the Humvee around.
"I saw two soldiers walking to another vehicle, wounded," he said. "I knew right away a grenade made it into the gunner's hatch."
Thanks to the warnings McGinnis yelled down to his fellow soldiers, everyone in the truck had time to tuck their heads down and protect themselves, Baka said.
The explosion knocked Thomas unconscious for about five seconds. When he came to, with minor lacerations on his left shoulder and neck and a large contusion on his back, he saw a man on a nearby rooftop.
"I presumed he threw the grenade because of the way he was leaning over the side of the building to see the damage he had done," Thomas said. "I started to engage him. I don't know if I wounded him or killed him. He disappeared."
Sgt. Lyle Buehler, the driver, was hit on the right side of his head by a piece of shrapnel. He also had shrapnel in his back and leg. Sgt. Ian Newland, who was sitting behind Buehler, suffered tendon damage when shrapnel pierced his left forearm. He also had shrapnel wounds on all his limbs.
Pfc. Sean Lawson, the platoon medic, who was sitting behind Thomas, suffered a perforated left eardrum and a mild concussion. Amazingly, Lawson didn't suffer shrapnel injuries and was able to provide medical aid to Buehler and Newland, Thomas said.
In the meantime, the other soldiers in the convoy gathered around the damaged Humvee to provide security.
Sgt. Patrick Cramer, one of the dismount team leaders, got into Thomas' vehicle and drove it back to the base, the vehicle's doors swinging open. Thomas said he didn't know McGinnis was dead.
"I saw him still sitting there," Thomas said. "I thought he was unconscious. I wasn't thinking that the blast had killed him."
As Cramer drove, Thomas tried to talk to McGinnis from the front seat.
"I couldn't turn around, so I patted him on his back vest plate," Thomas said. "I was screaming at him, 'McGinnis, wake up! Wake up! Are you OK?' The medic said, 'Sergeant T, he didn't make it.'"
It was only when the soldiers arrived at FOB Apache that Baka learned the blast killed McGinnis.
Newland was the only soldier in the Humvee who needed to be medically evacuated. He was taken to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. Newland has since been discharged from the hospital, Baka said. He walks with a cane and his left arm is in a sling, but during a memorial service in Germany for McGinnis, Newland walked up to the podium without his cane and solemnly saluted a memorial to his friend.
The soldiers are very shaken up by the incident, Baka said.
"But they're all alive because of Specialist McGinnis," he said.
Thomas, who went back on patrol three days after the incident, said he still can't believe McGinnis is gone.
"It's tough. You deal with it the best you can," he said. "Your guys need you, your soldiers need you, and you just kind of bounce back from it, but it's something you'll never forget no matter how old you get. He's a hero to me, and I will never forget him, ever. He honestly saved my life."
A memorial service for McGinnis was planned for Dec. 17 in Knox, about 100 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. His family plans to have his remains interred at Arlington National Cemetery this spring, Baka said.
McGinnis' father, Tom, declined to be interviewed by Marine Corps Times. In an e-mail to a reporter, Tom McGinnis wrote: "There is little to tell you about my son Ross, other than that he was not a star, he was not an overachiever or an academic wonder. He was a regular boy with his faults and his own unique qualities that caused everybody that really knew him to love him."
Officials at Keystone High School, which McGinnis' two older sisters also attended, are planning a memorial for him, Walters said.
His graduating class is putting together a scrapbook of his school years for his family, and some of his friends are creating a plaque that will be presented to the school. Walters said officials also are discussing a memorial that would be placed at the school.
Baghdad memorial
McGinnis' fellow soldiers had a memorial service for him Dec. 11 in Baghdad.
"Memorial services are extremely tough for all of us, but I think they're necessary for us to do for the closure," Baka said. "I think many of the soldiers here are honoring McGinnis by doing their job and doing the best they can."
The soldiers remembered their friend as a funny guy with a sharp sense of humor, a photography buff and a caring and attentive listener.
"It could be the worst day on Earth, and this guy would always find a bright side to whatever we had to do," Thomas said. "To me, that's what made him so special."
Baka said he has been in contact with Tom McGinnis.
"He's very proud of him. One thing he told me, he said he wished his son wasn't so brave," Baka said. "I told him I wish the same thing, but at the same time ... I think it makes it easier for the other soldiers, knowing he did it willingly and he did it to save the lives of other soldiers."
Back to 'Blood Brothers'
--
