Got a spare jet? Soldiers want a holiday trip home
PORTLAND, Ore. – Two hundred Northwest soldiers found out at the last minute they get to come home for the holidays before leaving for Afghanistan, but they’ve got to figure out how to pay for that trip themselves.
Many families can’t afford the $400 and the National Guard in Oregon and Washington said they don’t have the resources to fly these soldiers home.
Greg Warnock with the Oregon War Veterans Association is trying to raise $40,000 in the next few days to get these local soldiers home for Christmas.
“They don’t have the money for this. They weren’t planning for this. They didn’t think they would be able to come home, and now suddenly they’re stuck,” said Warnock.
The Guard said that at the last minute the soldiers weren’t able to move forward into Kuwait from Fort McCoy in Wisconsin.
The soldiers are to eventually be deployed to Afghanistan for a year and will be doing some of the military’s most dangerous work: looking for and detonating bombs.
A previous plan to bring the Washington National Guard soldiers home using a plane out of McChord Air Force Base fell through. Military regulations somehow stood in the way of that.
So it’s up to Warnock and anyone else who’s willing to help.
“We rarely come to the public and ask for assistance,” said Warnock. “When we do, people respond, and that’s what we’re doing now.”
Late in the day Friday Warnock said he’d gotten in contact with the Portland Trail Blazers, who have a team jet and is working with them to see if something can be worked out. But he’s been turned down by other major corporations.
If, by chance, you have a spare jet or want to make a donation, you can go to the Oregon War Veterans Association Web site.
