Loved ones give wounded soldier a hero’s welcome
Sgt. Chayne Williams kissed his daughter Lehua yesterday after arriving at Honolulu Airport. Williams was wounded in Afghanistan by a roadside bomb that killed a fellow soldier.
Williams was welcomed with signs and lei.
Sgt. Chayne Williams, injured in February while deployed in Kandahar, Afghanistan, arrived at Honolulu Airport yesterday smiling as he approached family and friends.
Kailua High School graduate Sgt. Chayne Williams left Afghanistan wounded by a roadside bomb that also claimed the life of a friend, but returned yesterday to the kind of aloha only Hawaii could show.
More than 75 family and friends surprised the 25-year-old Schofield Barracks soldier at Honolulu Airport after a month of recovery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
As Williams arrived in the baggage claim area, a gaggle of youngsters surrounded the soldier, shouting, "Chayne! Chayne!" and piled lei high around his neck.
His grandfather Alo Sila Williams, president of the National Samoan Chiefs Council of America, and his wife, Etevise, have seven children and 38 grandchildren, and most of those family members were there yesterday to greet Williams.
The 2003 Kailua High School graduate said it felt good to see so many relatives and friends. His wife, Courtney, arranged the surprise homecoming, he said. The couple has three children, ages 5, 3 and 1.
"It feels kind of heavy on my heart right now. I really don’t know, I want to cry, I want to smile," Chayne Williams said of the big reception.
Williams was wounded and Spc. Andrew C. Wilfahrt, 31, of Rosemount, Minn., was killed when a roadside bomb exploded while the Schofield soldiers were on a foot patrol in Kandahar on Feb. 27. They were part of the 552nd Military Police Company, 8th Military Police Brigade, 8th Theater Sustainment Command.
The bomb went off behind Williams and sent him tumbling through the air.
"I heard the boom and I felt myself go forward," he said. "When I landed I tried to get up, but I couldn’t because of the wounds. I tried my hardest to make sure that my guys were doing what they needed to do to ensure that security was still set up around the area."
Williams was hit by shrapnel on his backside and down his legs, and had to have a skin graft on his left leg, he said.
He had been in Afghanistan for 7 1⁄2 months, working with Afghan National Police in Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban.
"We did our best to kick them (the Taliban) out. We did our best to integrate ourselves in the villages with the civilians," he said.
The missions were difficult and so were the living conditions, but the unit became very close, Williams said. "The friendships and bonds you get, it lasts a lifetime," he said.
Sgt. Anthony Boike, 26, from Taylor, Mich., was also there yesterday to welcome Williams back. Both are part of the 552nd MP Company, but Boike returned to Hawaii before the roadside bomb blast for medical care.
The pair had been on two deployments together to Iraq when they were based at Fort Hood, Texas. Boike has a large tattoo on his left arm of a combat memorial of empty boots and an upturned rifle topped by a helmet in memory of the fellow soldiers who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Wilfahrt, who died in the bomb blast that wounded Williams, was "very outgoing, real funny. He cared about his job a lot," Boike said.
Asked how he is doing after going through the bomb blast and loss of a friend, Williams said, "OK, I guess." He pushed himself in therapy so he could get out of Walter Reed, he said.
"It took a while for (the experience) to hit me," he added. About a week and a half ago, he watched an interview of Wilfahrt’s parents on YouTube that included the playing of taps, "and that’s what hit me," Williams said.
Now that he’s back in Hawaii, Williams said he plans on getting some schoolwork done so he can go through the Army nursing program.
