Volunteer Pilots Assist Marines, Families

Private pilots throughout the West are volunteering their time, planes and even personal frequent-flier mileage to help the Marines from Camp Pendleton wounded in Iraq and the families of those killed in the war.

The pilots’ group, Angel Flight West, is increasing its efforts as the base suffers its largest flood of casualties since the war began last year. More than 30 Marines from Camp Pendleton units have been killed in the last two weeks, largely in fighting near Fallujah. No exact tally of wounded has been released.

The pilots already have helped dozens of wounded Marines from the base and their families travel around the United States.

As casualties mounted sharply last week, the group appealed to private pilots to aid Marine family members who must travel to funerals or to visit wounded Marines hospitalized far from home. Within days, pilots donated hundreds of thousands of frequent-flier miles and began arranging flights.

Camp Pendleton officials say they are grateful.

“For these guys to dedicate their time, their planes and obviously a significant amount of money is absolutely incredible,” said Master Sgt. William Bonney, family readiness officer for the First Marine Division, which is stationed west of Baghdad.

Angel Flight is best known as a volunteer group that provides free transportation for patients in need of medical treatment. When the Iraqi war began last spring, however, the Santa Monica-based group met with officials at Camp Pendleton to offer its services. At the time, the base was not paying the cost of flying wounded Marines home for 30-day leaves, although that practice has changed. Angel Flight is now focusing on transporting relatives of Marines who have been wounded or killed.

To date, Angel Flight has arranged for 50 flights to assist Marines, through the use of its own pilots, or with their frequent flier miles or tickets provided through an arrangement with Frontier Airlines. Many of those missions have allowed Marines returning from Iraq to be reunited with their families.

“Most of those guys and girls who came home -- they were kids, 18- and 19-year-olds. To buy a plane ticket home just wasn’t possible,” said Cheri Cimmarrusti, the group’s director of mission operations.

“One of the points that has really stuck with me is that, no matter what people’s views are about the war, Iraq, George Bush,” she said, “our membership has remained committed to helping those young soldiers who are wounded or killed.”

One pilot flew Tavis C. McNair, 26, from Camp Pendleton to Medford, Ore., after he had been hurt in a Baghdad firefight last year while with the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines. McNair suffered shrapnel wounds in his face, neck and arms. When the plane landed at the local airport, he was greeted with a red-carpet reception of family, friends, television crews and well-wishers.

At the time, he could walk but was still recuperating, and all the rigors of a commercial flight would have been a strain, said his mother, Shirley P. McNair, of Medford. On the Angel Flight plane, however, he was able to relax and doze.

She calls the efforts of Angel Flight’s pilots a blessing.

“They were just such compassionate, caring people,” McNair said. “They treated my son as if he were precious cargo. It was something we never asked for, something we never thought possible.”

Pilots who have flown missions for Camp Pendleton say that their encounters with the young Marines have been memorable.

“Those kids were just amazing. They had the attitude about this, that it was a job that had to be done,” said Jim Mallen, 60, of Lake San Marcos, a retired financial executive who volunteers for Angel Flight West and owns a four-seat Beechcraft Bonanza.

Some flights, such as the one carrying McNair, are met with heroes’ welcomes. Two Bay Area pilots who flew Pvt. Chris George home last year witnessed two such homecomings -- first in Willows, Calif., and then in Saratoga, Wyo.

The young Marine had suffered shrapnel wounds to his face, eye and ear, said volunteer pilot Rich Conti, 49, of Alamo, Calif., who flew George from Palomar Airport near Camp Pendleton north to Willows, for a visit with some of his family.

Conti was struck by the Marine’s youth -- “he looked about 16” -- and by his manner of calling the pilots “sir.” He remembers the straightforward clarity with which the Marine responded when Conti asked him what his job was in Iraq.

“To kill Iraqi soldiers,” the young man said. He was greeted in Willows by 100 people waving flags and snapping pictures.

A second pilot, Robert W. Mills, 55, of Marin County, flew George from Willows to his small hometown in Wyoming during a snowstorm so fierce that he was forced to land briefly at an airport in Utah.

The snow continued as they neared Saratoga at nightfall. As the plane drew close to the ground, dozens of cars waiting below turned on their headlights to help it land.

“It was just stunning,” Mills recalled. When the plane touched down, a crowd of people raced in its direction as the snow intensified. “There was this wall of people. I was surrounded by people with balloons, with flags.... It was a real old-fashioned Norman Rockwell America.”