Halos and Heroes Hangar Celebration
October 4, 2008 4-8:30 PM
Virginia Beach "Warbird" Airport

with The Charlie Daniels Band

“Sacrifice…is the passion of great souls,” wrote the Swiss philosopher Henri Frederic Amiel.

Army Spc. Kevin Hardin lives out that shining truth.

The 21-year-old combat medic was in bed at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, recovering from a 13 ½ hour operation to repair severe injuries incurred in Iraq following a rocket-propelled explosion. When orderlies wheeled by with a gurney carrying a newly-wounded soldier, Kevin rose straight up and started pulling his plugs and tubes out, his mind shouting, “I’m going to get up and talk to that soldier. I know what he’s feeling! It’s scary. I want to tell him it’s going to be okay—I’m here for you.”

Hospital staff calmed him down and told him that indeed they wanted him to talk to the wounded but not now; he must give himself time to recover.

Kevin was on patrol in Samarra, Iraq, on September 30, 2007, when the explosion hit his Humvee. The blast sent 12 pieces of shrapnel into his skull and took fingers from both hands and flesh from his arms. He has no feeling in his hands except for in his right pinkie.

To date, he’s undergone 18 surgeries, including bone and skin grafts that have earned him the nickname “Patches.” He faces many more operations and “still has a long way to go,” his mother, Terry Hardin, says.

She says that as a medic, the hardest thing for him is to be dependent on help from others.

Kevin’s father, Charles, has been by his side since day one, giving up his job as a security guard in order to do so.

His mom, Terry, works as a legal secretary for a law firm in Palm Beach County, Florida. She has two other sons at home in Jupiter--Kyle and Keith--and an older son, Kenny, who lives in Massachusetts with his wife and daughter.

Kyle, 16, and Keith, 14, had to withdraw from school due to the family’s recurrent trips to Walter Reed. They are enrolled in a public “virtual” school. It’s a lot for Terry to manage.

Therefore, when she found Air Compassion for Veterans (ACV) on the Internet and learned of the free flights available to her family, she felt enormously relieved.

“Without the assistance of Air Compassion for Veterans, it would have been virtually impossible for us to travel to D.C. to be at Kevin’s bedside during this very difficult time,” she said. Jim Smith, ACV executive director, said it is “an honor to serve this heroic family in their time of need.”

Kevin, who received a Purple Heart decoration, remains upbeat. People often ask him if he has any regrets. “What is there to regret, if you’re doing it for your country? I would do it ten times over,” he said.

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