Saturday, April 21, 2007
MARINE LANCE CPL. KANE M. FUNKE
JUNE 2004, HIT
Hi Mom, sorry it's been so long since I've last called. Listen, I've got some news for you. Now don't worry I'm fine, but I got a story to tell you about today [...]
Earlier tonight we went out on the same kind of mission just different part of the road and there was no interpreter so I got my usual vehicle. I usually sit inside behind the driver but they wanted me up in the turrent on the gun today. So I'm the only one exposed to the outside. I told them I was scared and didn't want to go up there. I already had a bad headache from the first one. They wanted me up there because they didn't want me to be in shell shock and they wanted me to get back in the game.
[...] On our way back to go to Bronze maybe a mile away from the last one another one hit us. This one was bigger. It was a 155mm artillery shell filled with C4 explosive. [...] The force of the blast knocked me out and slammed me against the gun, and they said I fell lifelessly down into the hummer. They shook me and turned me all over looking for blood but there was none. Lance Corporal Daniel shook me and I came to, finally, and all I remember him saying is, "FUNKE get back on the gu, damn it! Get back on the gun." I did. I got up and got back on the gun. I was ok. [...] Your boy's alive mom.
Funke was killed in action in Anbar province on Aug13, about two weeks before he was scheduled to leave Iraq.
