Spc. Erin Robicheaux
256th Brigade Combat Team PAO
CAMP TIGERLAND, Iraq --When Sgt. Jason Glasscock dressed in his body armor on June 15 for a route clearance mission in an M1A1 Abrams tank with his unit, C Company, 1st Battalion, 156th Armor Regiment, 256th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, chances are he wasn't thinking that this was the day he would get a second chance at life.
Hours later, his gunner was screaming, "Glasscock's been shot! Glasscock's been shot!"
The crew was at a stand-still for close to an hour-and-a-half when Glasscock stood up in the turret to grab some gear from the outside of the tank. The next thing he knew, someone shot him in the ribs, just below his chest.
He said almost before he felt it, he heard a loud noise that sounded like a baseball hitting a catcher's mitt. It knocked him backwards and he felt a sharp pain, like someone jammed him in the ribs with a lead pipe.
Just as quickly as it happened, his instincts, as well as those of his crew kicked in.
"My gut reaction was to get down (in the turret) and I tried to grab the charging handle on my 50-cal. The gunner heard the shot and turned around to help me," he said.
Glasscock said his arms and legs went numb as he came down from the turret, probably from the sudden shock of getting hit. They took off his vest and pulled up his shirt to see how far the bullet went in.
He wasn't bleeding, but there was a huge bruise, and he said the impact rubbed his skin raw.
"I just let out a huge sigh of relief," said Glasscock.
The bullet penetrated two ammunition magazines and went deep into his vest, but did not break through. It was embedded so deep into the body armor that Glasscock could feel it through the inside panel, closest to his body.
Once they saw he was okay, the Soldiers scanned the area to see if the sniper was still out there, and used the vest to try to determine a general idea of where the shot came from.
Reinforcements came on the scene and searched the area, while Glasscock and the tank crew pulled security for the dismounts. They never saw the sniper.
After they arrived safely back at the base, doctors evaluated him and put him on light duty for a week, just as a precaution. Glasscock was not happy.
"I want to be out there," he said.
The plate in his vest was damaged and though it disintegrated the round, he does not want his fellow Soldiers to carry a false sense of confidence with the vest and become complacent.
"It obviously works, but it doesn't make you Superman," he said.
Glasscock broke the news to his father the next day. He said he found it easy to talk to his father about his experience because he is a Desert Storm veteran.
When he told him what happened, Glasscock tried to break the news in as light a manner as possible.
"I told him if he gets a call from the Department of the Army, not to worry about it, that I"d been shot but I was alright," he said.
Glasscock said his father instinctively knew it was the vest that stopped the bullet.
| Date Taken: | 07.08.2005 |
| Date Posted: | 07.08.2005 15:20 |
| Story ID: | 2329 |
| Location: | BAGHDAD, IQ |
| Web Views: | 49 |
| Downloads: | 10 |
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