Photo By Sgt. Stephen Decatur | Sgt. Simon Baum, an infantry team leader with Company A, 2nd Battalion, 508th...... read more read more
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — On June 5, 2007, Spc. Simon Baum of Saginaw, Mich., an infantryman with Troop C, 4th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team (Task Force Fury), 82nd Airborne Division, was driving a Humvee in a convoy of almost two dozen vehicles. They were escorting a group of engineers past the barren, rolling hills on the road from Shirona to Wazi-Kwa in Paktika province, Afghanistan. Also riding in the vehicle were his platoon sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class Benjamin Weber, the gunner, Spc. Ryan Greenwood, and a Polish soldier they were transporting.
Suddenly, there was a violent explosion.
"I was really pissed my iPod was broken," Baum said. Now a sergeant and team leader with Company A, 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, TF Fury, Baum jokes that he has returned to Afghanistan to seek revenge for being wounded in an improvised explosive device attack two years ago.
"I was excited to come here and be a team leader," Baum said. "I've got a great group of guys."
The 30-year old combat veteran celebrated for his sense of humor became even more celebrated when, two days before leaving for Afghanistan, he and his wife Rebecca found out that they would be having their first child, and their second child and their third child.
Although Baum jokes about the injuries he suffered in Afghanistan, it would take two years, five surgeries and a possible medical discharge before he could return to the job he loves.
"We were listening to Led Zeppelin inside the truck, I will never forget that," Baum said. "I heard 'good times, bad times,' and that's the last thing I remember."
Staff Sgt. Aaron Best, who was in the truck directly behind Baum's, remembers seeing the blast. The front of the vehicle was destroyed and the doors were blown open. Later Best and his fellow paratroopers would find the vehicle's tow bar 800 meters down the road, he said.
When Baum came to, he saw the truck's windshield was gone. He looked down to make sure he still had all his limbs and saw the four-foot deep blast crater directly below him.
Baum was covered in black soot and bleeding from several shrapnel cuts. He fell as he tried to get out of the vehicle.
He then felt blood on his face and realized he was in pain. Greenwood and one of the troop's medics dragged Baum away from the vehicle. Both Greenwood and Weber had fractures and cuts from the IED's shrapnel, but Baum had taken the brunt of the blast. His right wrist was broken, his right fibula was fractured, he had torn cartilage in his right knee and numerous small cuts from shrapnel. He would later be diagnosed with mild traumatic brain injury.
The Polish soldier had been miraculously untouched by the blast and was already well away from the Humvee, pulling security.
"He didn't look like he'd been in an IED at all," Baum said.
Baum told Weber he was sorry he'd hit an IED; he didn't hit it on purpose.
"There was a lot of laughing," Baum said, "'Man, that was crazy. I can't believe that happened.'"
"You can't do much about it but laugh," said 1st Sgt. Matthew Parrish, Baum's first sergeant. "You have to have a sense of humor ... because you're alive."
Immediately after the IED attack the paratroopers formed a perimeter around their convoy and spotted a group of men fleeing the scene, Best said. They pursued them to a nearby village where the residents told them that the men weren't from there. The Paratroopers tracked the group down to an orchard where they got into a firefight.
Within 15 minutes from the time the IED went off, the triggerman was killed, and the spotter and emplacer were captured, Best said. Meanwhile, Baum drifted in and out of consciousness, he said. Within 30 minutes, the medevac helicopter arrived.
Four days later Baum was strapped to a litter in plane taking off for Germany. No sooner did the aircraft ease into a cruise than Baum saw a bright flash through one of the windows, and the pilot commenced a series of gut-churning evasive maneuvers. As if it wasn't enough that they blew him up, the Taliban were trying to shoot him out of the sky.
Baum has a talent for making light of even the most serious situation. His sense of humor and positive attitude were missed back in Afghanistan.
"He never let anything get to him," Best said. "Whenever I'd be in a bad mood, he'd make a joke and get me smiling again."
Baum was taken to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany where he was expected to make a full recovery and rejoin his comrades within weeks. But something was wrong with his wrist, and when the doctors discovered it was much worse than they had initially thought, they gave him surgery and sent him home.
Weber and some of Baum's buddies from C Troop called to see how he was doing back in the U.S. Everyone in his platoon signed one of his hats that had been left behind and sent it to him, Best said.
But Baum wasn't happy to be back in the rear. He spent most of his time recuperating from a series of surgeries on his wrist, and his mind was always with his fellow Paratroopers, he said.
"My unit was deployed, and I wasn't doing a lot." Baum said. "I had an overwhelming sense of being worthless. Here I am home, and my buddies are still fighting."
After visiting a friend in the amputee ward at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Baum was humbled, he said; his life was not so bad.
In December 2007 Baum was transferred from 4th Brigade to Fort Bragg's Warrior Transition Battalion. When C Troop's paratroopers returned from their 15-month deployment in the spring of 2008, Baum was waiting for them as they got off the plane. He later went to the promotion board and became a noncommissioned officer.
But all was not well at the WTB. Baum missed being on regular duty, he said.
"I view that time as if I were out of the military. I didn't feel like I was in." Baum said.
Baum was told by his case manager at the WTB that his packet for the medical discharge board was being started.
Exhausted by a seemingly endless cycle of surgery, physical therapy, pain and pain killers, Baum didn't know what to do.
"All I really want to do is be infantry," Baum said.
Before joining the Army, Baum got a degree in communication from Saginaw Valley University and worked as a warehouse manager at his father-in-law's company in Saginaw, Mich. It paid well, and he was good at it, but it was just a paycheck, Baum said.
"In the Army I feel like I'm doing something with my life," Baum said.
Baum was also motivated by a profound sense of duty to his country, he said.
"I would rather spend 15 months away from my family than have something like 9/11 happen again," Baum said. "If I have to come back here every other year, I say it's worth it."
Finally, in August 2008 Baum had his last surgery. After six weeks he began to heal, and soon he was doing everything within his ability to get back into shape. He spent a lot of time with Greenwood, who joined him at the WTB after he was injured a second time by getting pinned between two vehicles.
Just when Baum was ready to fight for the job he loved, the whole issue melted away. Baum went to his case officer in January 2009 to ask about challenging his med board. His case officer told him that since his packet had taken so long due to the number of Soldiers at Fort Bragg waiting to be med boarded, it had timed out and was being dropped.
When Parrish, who knew Baum from 4-73 Cav., heard that Baum was leaving the WTB in April 2009, he immediately started making phone calls to get him in his unit, Parrish said.
"I thought he was a solid Soldier, and saw good things in him," Parrish said. "He cares about Soldiers. To me there's nothing more important than that in an NCO."
Baum's favorite part about being an NCO is passing his knowledge and experience down to younger troopers, he said.
But for all his good humor, Baum is serious when it comes to taking care of his paratroopers, and his experience has shown him how serious his job can be.
"I've been through this before," Baum said. "I understand the real danger of what I'm doing."
The next time Baum returns from Afghanistan, he will not only be a leader of men, but also a father of three. He approaches the enormous task of raising triplets with characteristic calm.
"I still don't think I've let that sink in," he said.
| Date Taken: | 09.20.2009 |
| Date Posted: | 09.20.2009 05:45 |
| Story ID: | 39037 |
| Location: | KANDAHAR, AF |
| Web Views: | 619 |
| Downloads: | 538 |
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