VA employee helps save man's life on Interstate 10 overpass FOX Phoenix 10 News August 21, 2018
"He has just that absolute frustrated look on his face. That look on someone's face. You can tell deep inside, he was really hurting," said Odis Bailey. "You could tell the mixed emotions of rage, sadness."
PHOENIX (KSAZ) -- A man shut down part of the I-10 freeway in Downtown Phoenix during the morning rush hour, threatening to jump from an overpass into oncoming traffic.
Four people pulled over to help, and one man even climbed to the top of the overpass, in an effort to try and save a stranger's life.
The man was on top of the 3rd Avenue pedestrian bridge. Before law enforcement got involved, a group of Phoenix VA employees stopped their morning commute to help. The man was a stranger to them, but his distress was all too familiar.
Bailey climbed up the fence too, and they spent about 15 minutes talking.
"The first part was basically trying to comfort him, that I do care, I was up here because I cared about him," said Bailey. "He had some family issues. Father who had passed away, battling drugs, dealing with not having contact with his son, and the straw that broke the camels back was he was sleeping behind a bush, and someone kicked him out." read more here
When will we care enough to save those who save us? Combat PTSD Wounded Times Kathie Costos August 21, 2018 If you think dropping the D from PTSD is a good idea, then it proves you really do not understand much. The "thing" that gave them PTSD in the first place, was a lot harder than dealing with a lousy letter. If they have a problem with it, then we have a much bigger problem than anyone is aware of, because if the stigma ends up killing them, instead of the event itself, our shame has just sunk to a new low. This may finally get you to understand that men and women, valued human life so much, they were willing to die to save others. They rushed into burning homes, to accidents, to disaster after disaster, yet the following lost their lives because of what all their efforts did to them.
There are a lot more but, most of them do not have their names released. What you see in obituaries around the country are usually along the lines of "died suddenly" and it is the families right to keep it private. What will never, ever, make any of this right, is for it keep happening without the national news paying attention to any of this. At least now, the pubic has a chance to learn what we've been reading so far this year.
Blind Horses, Combat Veterans Get Second Chance At Life At This Rescue WFMY News 2 Author: Laura Brache August 20, 2018
Flurry's Hope Blind Horse Rescue rescues horses that were going to be euthanized because of their blindness and provides therapeutic experiences for combat veterans with PTSD.
MADISON, N.C. (WFMY) – A couple of right turns off US 220 N in Madison and you’ll come across a farm with a little over a dozen horses.
While you may see them trotting and running through the fields, there’s something you won’t notice.
All of the horses are blind.
The farm is called Flurry’s Hope Blind Horse Rescue.
“Flurry’s Hope is a blind horse rescue that demonstrates to the world that disability is not inability,” said founder and director Emilie Storch.
According to Storch, all of the horses on the farm were going to be euthanized because of their blindness.
“We have horses that are like $55,000, $11,000 and just because they were blind, nothing else, they were going to be killed,” Storch explained.
But Storch isn’t only giving the horses a second chance at life, it’s also a second chance for the veterans that volunteer to care for them. read more here
Attempted sale of stolen Pa. veteran grave markers ends in arrest: police PennLive By Steve Marroni August 21, 2018
Roughly 300 grave markers for veterans went missing from some Pennsylvania cemeteries.
Ronald Cichenelli Jr., of Johnstown, is facing charges after police say he tried to sell 300 stolen veteran grave markers at a scrap-metal yard in Waterloo, New York. (Screenshot/WJAC)
But when police say a Johnstown man tried to sell the 1,000 pounds of brass at a scrap-metal yard, employees called the police.
State police started the investigation when they were alerted about a man trying to get cash for the grave markers in Waterloo, New York, the Johnstown Tribune-Democrat is reporting.
Employees at the recycling center noticed some of the grave marker were stamped with "Cambria County Ebensburg, PA," prompting them to alert the authorities, according to reports. read more here
This story pisses me off more than I am allowed to say on a site open to all ages. When I read it, all I could think about what all the years members of the military were abused by their own and the abused by the departments that was supposed to help them and give them justice. I think about the older veterans I've know over the years suffering this triple betrayal, and the younger ones who followed because nothing was done before they were even born. Now this part from a USA Today article made my head explode with all of their voices screaming for justice!
"The drop-off in focus on such claims at the VA coincided with a national uproar over a massive backlog in benefits claims at the agency. The backlog, which reached as many as 600,000 claims in 2013, had been reduced to 80,000 by the end of last year."
The crucial reality is, everyone did not care enough over a decade ago...and we need to take a seriously look at how much we really do care! Sexual trauma claims by veterans wrongly denied by VA, investigation finds USA TODAY Donovan Slack Aug. 21, 2018
Such pledges were met with caution Tuesday among veteran advocates and assault survivors like Ruth Moore. She was raped twice by a supervisor in the Navy and endured repeated denials of her claims by the VA over 23 years.
WASHINGTON – The Department of Veterans Affairs improperly denied hundreds of military sexual trauma claims in recent years, leaving potentially thousands of veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder without benefits, a VA inspector general investigation found.
Last year alone, the investigation found the agency mishandled as many as 1,300 sexual trauma claims. Some 12,000 veterans file for sexual trauma-related PTSD benefits each year.
The inspector general found the VA failed to order required medical exams in more than half the cases, didn’t obtain necessary records to back up the claims in hundreds of cases or denied claims despite contradictory evidence.
The agency neglected to provide adequate training to employees vetting the claims. It stopped conducting quality audits of the sexual trauma claims process in 2015. And the following year, it shunted the claims into a national queue where staff without any specialized knowledge processed them.
The VA has specialized processing for other types of claims, including those related to traumatic brain injuries or from prisoners of war.
The inspector general recommended the agency review denied claims, reintroduce specialized vetting and audits, and provide better training for claims processors.
In response to the findings, Paul Lawrence, the VA’s top benefits official, said the agency will comply with the recommendations. read more here So where was the outrage in 2006?
Fire Captains talk post-traumatic stress injury in firefighters KUSI San Diego Carlos Amezcua August 20, 2018
Last year, 108 firefighters took their lives. It is estimated that 40% of suicides within the firefighter community go unreported due to the stigma placed on mental health issues.
Post-traumatic stress injuries are having a devastating impact on all of our first responders, including firefighters.
Carlos Amezcua sat down with Fire Captain Jeff Griffith and Jeff Dill from the National Firefighters Behavioral Health Alliance to talk about firefighter PTSI and suicide prevention.
Post-traumatic stress injury (PTSI) is a mental health injury and is the leading cause of death for first responders. PTSI occurs with repeated exposure to life altering events, such as being on the front lines of repeated disaster. Fires, homicides, mass shootings, and domestic violence are just a few of the traumatic events firefighters face on a regular basis.
These are life changing events, not only for the individual civilians involved, but also for the first responders who address these issues regularly in the line of duty. According to Jeff Dill, firefighter suicides out pace line of duty deaths by 50%, in other words, half of all deaths in the firefighting community are suicides. read more here
Kansas man gets letter by mistake, helps reunite Vietnam Veterans KAKE News written by Annette Lawless
The three met this week. It turns out the James and Jimmy had a lot in common. Not only do they share the same name, but they are both pilots and have also worked for Cessna. Jimmy’s wife’s name is Mary. James’s mom’s name is also Mary.
A handwritten note changed everything for James Porter.
This summer, James got an unexpected piece of mail from California. In it, a man named John Washe wrote a plea to find a friend who served in the Vietnam War.
“I’m attempting to locate an x Army buddy named Jimmy Lee Porter of Wichita. Worked for Cessna,” he wrote in the note, dated July 19. “He is in his very early 70’s now, was stationed as a draftee in Ft. Hood between 1966 and 1968. If this is the correct Jimmy, pls let me know.”
This is the second note John would send to Porter. The first letter came 15 years ago, but James was motivated this time around to help out the man.
James contacted several military organizations, like the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Veterans Administration. Some told him that Jimmy Lee Porter wasn’t in their record books. James contacted KAKE’s Annette Lawless for help, fearing the man may be dead.
Yet, days later, James found Jimmy.
It was perfect timing, as John had plans to drive through Kansas soon. read more here
Homeless veteran lived in the shadow of downtown Gazette Extra By Neil Johnson Aug 19, 2018
“He was a Vietnam vet and one of the guys whose mind never came home from the war,” John Eccles said. “Two minutes in a firefight can change your life.”
Dan Eccles
A troubled man Eccles, 68, was a Vietnam War veteran. While still a teenager, he served in the 27th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army, a group of fighters nicknamed the “Wolfhounds,” his family said. He fought in Cù Chi in South Vietnam in 1968, fending off surprise attacks from a vast network of enemy, underground tunnels dug by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong armies.
Dan Eccles’ body was pulled from the Rock River near the Centerway Dam, just downstream from a spot on the river bank where he was known to crawl into the weeds to sleep at night.
Eccles’ world, such as it was, spanned a quarter-mile, unpaved trail along the west side of the Rock River near downtown Janesville. The heavily wooded section of the Ice Age Trail runs north of Centerway, along the tangled railroad hillside just east of Mercyhealth Hospital and Trauma Center.
In that area across the river from Traxler Park where the Rock Aqua Jays perform, observers say they had seen Eccles and still see other homeless men in the woods and along the trails. Some are drunk and dirty. Others sleep on old couch cushions and mattresses in plain view. Some take to the bushes and stay under blue tarps or in tents. read more here
Trump and Omarosa Had a ‘F*cking Weird’ Fight With Vietnam Vets The Daily Beast Asawin Suebsaeng 08.17.18
As if having Omarosa heading up veterans’ issues wasn’t strange enough, President Trump started arguing with Vietnam vets about napalm and Agent Orange.
Source present at the time tell The Daily Beast that multiple people—including Vietnam War veterans—chimed in to inform the president that the Apocalypse Now set piece he was talking about showcased the U.S. military using napalm, not Agent Orange.
Trump refused to accept that he was mistaken and proceeded to say things like, “no, I think it’s that stuff from that movie.”
Early on in the Donald Trump administration, the president vested many of his nearest and dearest with tasks they were woefully unprepared for—and Apprentice superstar Omarosa Manigault-Newman was no exception.
Long before she was his chief antagonist, Manigault-Newman was tapped by President Trump to handle veterans’ issues for the White House—causing immediate backlash from vets organizations who read this as a slap in the face and a betrayal of his campaign rhetoric about “taking care of our veterans.” read more here
Vietnam veterans reunite with ailing 'brother' Tribune-Star By Alex Modesitt 9 hrs ago
“When I got back from Vietnam I was tired of sleeping on the ground. So I joined the Air Force,” Dierdorf joked. Dierdorf served out the rest of his 27-year armed services career with the U.S. Air Force.
Ken Dierdorf wanted so badly to sit alongside his Army brothers and feel the rush of air blow through an open-sided UH-1 Iroquois “Huey” one last time at Saturday’s Terre Haute Air Show.
But fate, weather and his advanced Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis — ALS — wouldn’t allow it.
Meant as one last hurrah for a group of Vietnam veterans who call themselves the “Dirty Half Dozen,” the Visiting Nursing Association and Hospice of the Wabash Valley arranged for Dierdorf and his U.S. Army brethren from around the country to take one last ride in a Huey.
But the flight, scheduled to take off around 9 a.m., was grounded due to fog blanketing the airfield. True to form, as the soldiers’ wives tell it, the group didn’t pay the weather much attention as they waited, instead they took the opportunity to catch up on each others’ goings on and tell stories.
And boy were the stories from veterans that served together in second platoon of the 1st Cavalry Division’s 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, Bravo Company worth hearing.
read more here
