Spc. Chris McCann
2nd BCT, 10th Mtn. Div. PAO
CAMP STRIKER, Iraq - "I’m one of those guys who believe in leading from the front."
His face is boyish and unassuming, and bears not a trace of the bullet that could’ve cost him his life. Staff Sgt. Kyle Keenan, a native of Newark, Ohio, and a scout section leader with the 1st Squadron, 89th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) out of Fort Drum, N.Y., is a lucky man. An Iraqi terrorist shot him at point-blank range with a pistol, and he shrugged it off and fired back.
Keenan said his platoon, from Troop C, 1-89, was preparing for a routine mission the afternoon of July 1 when they had an abrupt change of plan and were called for an immediate air assault into a sparsely populated area southwest of Baghdad. An anonymous tipster said he had just invited two leaders of a local terrorist group to his house for tea.
"We went to the pickup zone at about 2:20 p.m. to get onto two UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters, and by 2:35 we were in the air," he said. "It only took six or seven minutes of flying time."
Often, when getting off a helicopter, Soldiers take a few steps out the door and get down, making a defensive perimeter. This time, he said, they did a "rush," not stopping at all.
"While we were still in the air, we saw two men running away from the target house in track suits - one green, one grayish. The one in green ran north, the other went south, and my section went after the guy in green, because he was closest to us."
Keenan, true to his word, was in the front of their wedge-shaped formation, the point man, carrying not only his usual M-4 carbine but a 12 gauge, pump Shotgun.
"We went toward where we last saw him, came around the corner of a house, and saw a reedline. We knew we were looking for him in the field there - but when I looked two or three feet away, downward, I saw his face and his eyes, and told him ‘Get up! Americans!,’ and right then, I heard a pop and my head snapped back."
His team leader, just behind him and to the right, saw Keenan’s head jerk back and heard the shot as well.
"As soon as (the terrorist) shot, I saw the flash and saw him - he was pretty close," said Sgt. Joseph Connolly, a native of Minneapolis, Minn.
"For a split second, I thought Keenan was dead, but I didn’t even think about it, I just engaged."
"I realized I’d been shot," Keenan said, "but I didn’t know if it was in the head, or in my Kevlar (helmet). I regained my vision and unloaded five rounds of double-ought buckshot, which killed him."
Shocked, Connolly followed suit with his M-4 - just in case.
"The experience was so fast, there wasn’t even time to be surprised," said Connolly.
"We made the call that he was dead, and we moved out," Keenan said matter-of-factly. "I took point again. We detained two local nationals at the target house and turned them over to our medics and platoon sergeant, then went to the next house, detained two more, and then detained one at the last house, with a locked-and-loaded AK-47. We took them all to the platoon sergeant and started questioning them. They all said that the guy we really wanted had gone into the field, the one in the gray track suit."
They searched fruitlessly, Keenan said, searching the fields and reedlines, clearing the houses three times before another platoon arrived to secure the area and they could leave.
"After it was all over and we got back in the choppers, it hit me," he said. "It was a "thank God I’m alive" feeling."
The bullet pierced his helmet and traveled a few inches through the Kevlar before exiting near the top of his head, leaving a tuft of yellowish fiber sticking out.
The man was found to have two grenades with him - one with the pin pulled out.
Keenan said he was shot on a previous deployment, but the round struck his body armor and only bruised him. Improvised explosive devices likewise have detonated nearby, but failed to wound him.
"I’ve never been wounded, no Purple Hearts - scratches, little bruises, that’s all," he said. "This gear does what it’s supposed to do. It’s not supposed to stop the round, it’s supposed to deflect it, and that’s what it did. …but it was amazing at point-blank range."
"I’m pretty happy that it all worked out the way it did," Connolly said. "We got the two guys, and Staff Sergeant Keenan is okay."
After that mission, the platoon prepared their trucks and grabbed some food before heading out on another that afternoon, Keenan included. He told his wife about his near-miss when he got back late that night, but she had already heard from some other Soldiers in the unit.
"She was worried," he said, but he reassured her and their 10-year-old daughter that he was fine.
He won’t be changing the way he works, he added.
"As long as Soldiers see me do this, and see things like that happen and see me keep going - they’ll keep going through this deployment."
Something he definitely won’t change is the arrangement of moveable pads in his new helmet.
"I don’t like the padding much," he said, laughing. "I always wear my Kevlar low, right above my eyes … he was going to take one of us with him, and he was dead on if not for my Kevlar. I’m still mad, too - I really liked that one."
Staff Sgt. Kyle Keenan, section leader with Troop C, 1-89th Cav. Regt, 2nd BCT, 10th Mtn. Div., points out the lifesaving characteristics of his Advanced Combat Helmet. Keenan was shot in the helmet at point blank range by a 9mm pistol on a mission July 1. Local tips identified an insurgent leader in a safe house in abu
Staff Sgt. Kyle Keenan, section leader with Troop C, 1-89th Cav. Regt, 2nd BCT, 10th Mtn. Div., poses with his 12 gauge, pump shotgun at
1 user commented in " Lucky day for SSG Keenan "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackAmazing. Yes, very lucky. I am happy to report to that a vehicle that is apparently ied proof is finally being ramped up for production……I think it is called the Nrac. with a special design… my prayers to all the troops us and coalition in iraq and afghanistan.