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If you follow the link to the article there are a number of video clips available as well.
Ross Shores enjoyed his football days at Chandler's Hamilton High School. In fact he planned to continue his athletic career at Montana State.
But, he says too much football and parties and not enough school, led him to transfer to the University of Arizona. When he still couldn't seem to focus on education, he decided to join the Army.
Assigned to the Stryker Brigade, and stationed in Fairbanks, Alaska, Shores was eventually deployed to support Operation Iraqi Freedom. He arrived in Kuwait in August 2005.
Like so many other military service members from the Valley, Shores says Arizona's heat is nothing compared to the sweltering weather in Kuwait and Iraq.
While most of his company worked out of Mosul, Iraq, Shores platoon was sent to Rawa, a rural area near the Syrian border. Their main mission was route clearance, which meant patrolling for roadside bombs.
"We were clearing the road for the rest of the brigade so that it can travel somewhat safely, as safely as we can make it," Shores explains, "Just go down the road and hope you find it, before it finds you."
While some of the devices were pretty complicated, he says the majority were really crude, just thrown on the side of the road and a lot of times, the reason they didn't go off, was because they were poorly made.
Shores says multiple bombs were detonated on them, but their massive armored Stryker vehicles sustained the brunt of the damage.
"We were like Superman in the vehicles we were in," Shores says. So, it was a real eye opener, when two soldiers from their company were killed by roadside bombs.
And then a bigger shock. His good friend, and a member of his own platoon, Sergeant Bryan Luckey was killed by a sniper on June 29th 2006. The soldiers had rotated out of Rawa and were doing route clearance in Mosul.
"The sniper had killed a few guys within the week, and the week before," Shores explains. "Everyone's aware of the situation, yet you still have a job to do." [...]