SauceJockeySyndicate

A Kevlar combat helmet is designed to protect the head of the Marine wearing it. On April 14, 2004, twenty-two-year-old U.S. Marine Corporal Jason Dunham ripped his helmet off his own head to save the two Marines standing beside him. Weeks earlier, Dunham could have gone home to New York when his enlistment ended. Instead, he signed an extension paper so he would not leave his squad behind in Iraq, buying his younger Marines birthday cakes and calling home so their mothers could hear their voices. While patrolling the dusty streets of Husaybah near the Syrian border, Dunham's squad stopped a white SUV packed with rocket-propelled grenades and rifles after an ambush on a Marine convoy. When the driver lunged out of the vehicle and grabbed Dunham by the throat, the two men tumbled to the dirt street in hand-to-hand combat. Two of Dunham's Marines rushed in to help their squad leader. Suddenly, Dunham saw the insurgent release an armed fragmentation grenade right onto the dirt between their feet. Why could Dunham not throw the grenade away or tell his men to dive behind the Humvee? Because the insurgent had already held the lever down before dropping it, leaving less than two seconds before detonation, and Dunham's two Marines were standing right over it in the open street. Even worse, a human body alone cannot always contain heavy grenade fragments at point-blank range. In a fraction of a second, Dunham made a calculation that saved both of his men. Shouting "No, no, watch his hand!", Dunham ripped his Kevlar helmet off his bare head, slammed the hard ballistic shell directly over the live grenade, and threw his own chest on top of the helmet to hold it down. The explosion shattered the Kevlar helmet into fragments and mortally wounded Dunham, while both of his fellow Marines survived. Doctors kept Dunham alive long enough for his mother and father to fly to Bethesda Naval Hospital. When his parents held his hand, the young Marine squeezed his father's fingers once before passing away. Today, the U.S. Navy destroyer USS Jason Dunham sails the oceans bearing his name.