LOWELL, Mass. – Spc. Vannek Pech, a radar operator with Battery E, (Target Acquisition Battery), 101st Field Artillery Regiment, Massachusetts National Guard, holds his newborn daughter Evelyn , with wife Leakhena Ian in the background, shortly after arriving at Lowell General Hospital here, Dec. 6 2010. Pech had just boarded a plane and was prepared to deploy when senior leaders pulled him off to rush him to be with his wife. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. 1st Class Don Veitch, Massachusetts National Guard Public Affairs)
By Army Sgt. 1st Class Don Veitch, Massachusetts National Guard
LOWELL, Mass. – Seventy deploying Soldiers filed from the bus that had brought them across the flight line to the waiting command group and the aircraft that would fly them from Hanscom Air Force Base to their mobilization site at Fort Bliss, Texas on Dec. 6, 2010.
The line snaked along with starts and stops as the Soldiers, apparently preoccupied with their own thoughts, hesitated briefly as they acknowledged the general and two command sergeants major waiting to wish them off as they reached the foot of the boarding stairs.