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Vernon recounts plunge over cliff

Aug-24-2004 » Filed Under: 3/2 SBCT

Quite a story.

[Link to Full Article]

By Leslie Slape

As their 19-ton armored Stryker tipped nose-first, then plummeted off a 30-foot cliff in Iraq, "I knew it was going to hurt -- a lot," Army Spc. Nick Vernon wrote. "That's when I grabbed Justin."

In an e-mail he sent Monday to The Daily News, the Castle Rock native was modest about his role in pulling Sgt. Justin Little of Longview to safety.

"I don't feel like I saved his life," he wrote. "We are all trained, and trained well. I did my job and everyone made it out alive."

Vernon said that the six-man Stryker crew was in the Nineveh province of Iraq near the Syrian border Wednesday night when the front wheels touched the edge of a cliff at around 10:10 p.m.

"The edge was difficult to see at night with no lights and only night vision devices," he wrote. "We paused on the edge for a moment, but before we could reverse our direction the bank gave way, the vehicle tipped vertical and fell straight down about 30 feet."

Little, the gunner, was is in the turret atop the vehicle, exposed from about the waist up. [...]


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