go for a friend? Specialist Phil Dodson knows the answer to that question. His best pal, Corporal Joe Lombardi, went all the way to war with him. Lombardi was simply being a good friend when he agreed to join the army on the buddy plan with his friend Phil almost four years ago. Best friends since grade school, recent graduates from Spencerport High School, neither had found the right niche for their future and were struggling in dead-end jobs. Phil's father, Pete Dodson, strongly encouraged his son to join the military. Phil agreed if Joe would go, too. Tans and Al Lombardi weren't pleased when their only son came home and told them he'd joined the army. "The worst day of my life was when they came to take him to basic (training)," Tans recalls. Phil and Joe went through basic together before being stationed at Ft. Hood, Texas. They learned how to drive Humvees, handle land mines, and work with explosives. "We learned how to blow things up," Phil explained cutting through the technical jargon. Neither suspected they would be using this training in Iraq in the near future. In January 2003, both men were told they were being deployed to Iraq but it wasn't until April that Lombardi's unit actually climbed aboard a plane to head to Kuwait. Dodson's unit followed four days behind him. Neither recalls feeling anything except relief that they were finally going. The one thing Phil says sticks in his mind is the ceremony at Ft. Hood in which the flags were changed from garrison to combat colors. "That made it seem very real," he says. Corporal Joseph Lombardi, Bravo Company, 588th Engineer Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, landed in Kuwait on April 7, 2003. "We had waited since January to go," he said. He wasn't nervous or scared; simply glad they were finally there. "The sooner we got there, the sooner we could go home," he remembers thinking. It would be six months and a lifetime of experiences before the two friends would be reunited back in Spencerport. Specialist Phil Dodson with Alpha 299, Engineer Battalion, 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division convoyed from Kuwait to the City of Tikrit, near the Tigress River. Lombardi's unit traveled northeast to the city of Ba´Quabah. Lombardi's memories of the ride through Baghdad are vivid. The temperature hovered around 110 degrees and the city was like nothing he'd ever seen before. "It was truly a war torn city," he remembers. Dodson says he realized quickly that the training they received in basic was not going to work in this war. "Everything changed over there. You couldn't do this by the book. The man next to you in civilian clothes could turn and shoot you. It was truly guerrilla warfare." Lombardi agreed. "There was no way to train for Iraq. We had no idea what we were facing before we got there." The rationed supplies - one bottle of water and one meal a day, the lack of any type of sleeping accommodations, and the bugs - all made life miserable but they both agree it was the heat and the sand that made it hell. "The sand literally tore the skin from your body," Joe remembers. "When you rode in a vehicle, the wind in your face felt like a blowdryer because it was so hot," Phil recalls. It was in late July, while patrolling outside the city of Ba´Quabah, that Corporal Lombardi was ambushed. It was the third time he's been involved in such an attack. "Ambushes were the worst because it's complete chaos," he said. Such was the case the day his Humvee was hit with a grenade. The force of the hit knocked him and the solider in the passenger seat from the vehicle. The soldiers in the back were thrown to the floor and stayed there. Joe and his fellow comrade sustained immediate damage to their ear drums. He remembers not being able to hear anything but knowing he had to get out of there. "I helped my passenger climb back in and then I drove us out of there as fast as I could," he explained. He was transported to a local hospital not knowing the extent of the damage to his hearing. Back in Spencerport, his mother received the phone call she'd been dreading since he left. "A male voice said this is sergeant so and so, I have no idea to this day what his name was, and I'm calling you from Ft. Hood, Texas. Corporal Joe Lombardi has been hit by an RPG and is in the hospital." She was shocked and couldn't really comprehend what he was telling her. She knew that he said Joe had sustained some hearing loss and that he would be calling her in a few minutes. He told her to leave the phone line open. "This was at 6 p.m. and we waited all night and no call. By morning I was a wreck." Several days passed and no further word. She tried to get information from Ft. Hood as well as some of the hotlines that were set up for families of soldiers serving in Iraq. Desperate, she finally called Joe's original recruiter in Buffalo and begged him to help her. The recruiter called her back a few hours later with the news that Joe had refused to stay in the hospital and was back in action. Tans recalls telling the recruiter, "I'm going to ground that boy when he gets home," for not calling her. But at least she knew if he was back "on the line" he was OK. After his injury, Lombardi had been given the chance to go home but he declined. He was due to be discharged from the service in September and he wasn't going to leave a minute sooner. "These are men who I went through basic with, trained with, flew to Kuwait with, and fought beside. I wasn't about to desert them early," he said. Today his hearing is 100 percent in one ear but only partial in the other. Dodson had heard through the grapevine that Joe's unit had been ambushed but he had no way of knowing if his best friend was one of the injured or how severely he might be injured. Because Lombardi and Dodson signed up for the army at the same time they were scheduled to be discharged from the army at the same time. On September 11, Lombardi flew back to the United States, landing first in Maine. The hotel bar opened at 3:00 a.m. so the soldiers could have a drink. Elderly hotel guests and Vietnam vets were on hand to cheer them and welcome them home. "I was touched that they did that," Lombardi said. "For them to get up early in the morning and greet us and welcome us the way they did, was really moving." Dodson followed two weeks later and he remembers taking a deep breath and smelling the difference in the air. "It smelled good, clean and fresh, and I knew we were back in America." Joe Lombardi says he and Phil Dodson talked on the phone several times before actually getting to see one another in person again. "We just couldn't get our schedules to work out." Finally the reunion took place at a local pool hall. "We hugged and all that but it wasn't a big emotional scene," he said. Far more emotional was the reunion with their families. Joe's parents, Al and Tans, his younger sister, Nikki, cousins, and friends all got together November 15 and gave him a welcome home party in Northampton Park in Ogden. Attended by over 100 people, they deep fried turkeys and had all the traditional Thanksgiving trimmings. "It seemed fitting, given we have so much to be thankful for, that we had a Thanksgiving party to welcome him back," his mother said. Tans said she could never have gotten through those six months without the unwavering support of her friends, extended family, and co-workers at Bunzl Corporation in Chili. "I will never be able to thank them enough." She realizes as well that she has a lot for which to be thankful. Both men came home and her heart goes out to other families who weren't as fortunate. "I never hear about any casualty without thinking of that soldier's parents. It affects me in a totally different way than it did before my son was sent over there." Phil's family, Dad Pete and Stepmother Kim, his mother, Kristy Farrand and stepfather, Chris, along with his younger sisters, Kiestyn, Tori and Gabrielle, his grandparents from Florida as well as his grandmother, Ogden Supervisor Gay Lenhard, were all at the airport the day he flew home. "He was supposed to arrive at 9 a.m. and never got in until 6 that night. Most of us stayed there the entire day waiting," his father said. The family threw him a volleyball-themed welcome home party, grateful to have him back home safe and sound. Both men agree that Iraq is not a place they'd ever like to return to but the experience touched them in ways they'll never forget. Phil recalls how absolutely breathtaking the sky was over the desert. "With no other lights, no tall buildings, the sky is unbelievable. No cloud cover and every night is a beautiful night." Joe talks of the children who he'll never forget. "They live in the most unbelievable conditions, the worst I've ever seen, and yet they are always smiling." He and the other men in his unit would buy them ice cream and candy whenever they could. He also maintains that there were some good people over there. "Some of the Iraqis were truly grateful we were there." Phil was surprised by the closeness he experienced with the men in his unit. "I've never experienced that kind of friendship, that kind of bonding, with anyone ever before." Joe Lombardi reminds his buddy that he was in Iraq because of their friendship. Phil Dodson immediately apologized for talking him into joining the army. "He has apologized at least 20 times since we got back for talking me into joining," Joe laughs. "Believe me, he owes me." "I joined the army to get an adventure," Phil Dodson said. "I think we got one," Joe Lombardi agreed. Note: Next for the soldiers - Dodson plans to attend Texas State University on the GI Bill to study to become a teacher. Lombardi recently took the Rochester Police and the Sheriff's exam, hoping for a career in law enforcement. |
