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Officials say a Maui man is one of the 30 American service members killed when a military helicopter was shot down in Afghanistan. Another Navy SEAL had been based in Hawaii for four years, friends said.
Kraig Vickers, a 1992 graduate of Maui High School, was killed when the Chinook helicopter he was in was hit and went down in eastern Afghanistan Saturday.
Most of the U.S. troops on board were elite Navy SEALs, who had rushed to help Army Rangers who had come under fire, two U.S. officials said Sunday.
The rescue team had completed the mission, subduing the attackers who had the Rangers pinned down, and were departing in their Chinook helicopter when the aircraft was apparently hit, one of the officials said.
Vickers, 36, was a Navy Bomb Disposal Team member, his father, Robert Vickers told the Maui News.
“He would have turned 37 on August 11th,” his father told the newspaper.
Attempts by The Associated Press to reach Robert Vickers for additional comment on Sunday were unsuccessful.
Kraig Vickers lived in Virginia Beach, Va., with his wife, Nani, who was pregnant, and their three children, his friend from childhood, Michael Labuanan, told the Maui News.
“I gravitated towards Kraig because of his easygoing personality and the drive to become the best person that he could be,” said Labuanan in an email to the newspaper.
U.S. Rep Mazie Hirono released a statement Sunday on the death of Vickers, extending her “gratitude to Kraig Vickers for his loyal service to our country.”
“We honor and remember the 30 American service members who gave their lives in Afghanistan. This tragic event is a stark reminder of the supreme sacrifices the women and men of the U.S. military make in serving our country,” the statement said.
The mother of another SEAL killed in Afghanistan says her son loved surfing and was based in Hawaii for four years when he first joined the Navy.
If someone was sad, Michael Strange tried to make them smile, friends and family said. He loved snowboarding, surfing, scuba diving, running, and shooting guns on the range.
“He loved his friends, his family, his country; he loved making people laugh. He was one of a kind,” Strange’s brother, Charles Strange III, 22, said Sunday outside the family’s Philadelphia home, where American flags were planted throughout the neighborhood.
Strange, 25, decided to join the military when he was still in high school, and had been in the Navy for about six years, first stationed in Hawaii and for the last two in Virginia Beach, where he became a SEAL about two years ago, his mother, Elizabeth Strange, told The Associated Press.
But he always told his family not to worry.
“He wasn’t supposed to die this young. He was supposed to be safe,” Elizabeth Strange said. “And he told me that and I believed him. I shouldn’t have believed him because I know better. He would say ‘Mom, don’t be ridiculous and worry so much. I’m safe.”’
Charles Strange said his brother loved the SEALS, especially “the competitiveness, getting in shape and running and swimming and all of that.”
He also had two sisters, 21-year-old Katelyn and 7-year-old Carly, and recently became an uncle. The family last saw him in June, when he came for a weeklong visit for his birthday, his mother said. He was supposed to be back for Thanksgiving.
“It was going to be such a good time,” his mother said.
