Wednesday, December 12, 2001
|
Wednesday, December 12, 2001 |
|
Take that, Osama! PTC's Gasko pilots F-14 on bomb missions against Al Qaeda terrorists By JOHN MUNFORD
A Peachtree City man is fighting terrorism firsthand, flying bombing missions over Afghanistan as part of America's war against terrorism. Lt. Kris Gasko, a 1992 graduate of McIntosh High School, pilots an F-14 stationed on the aircraft carrier Carl Vinson in the Middle East. While details of his wartime activity are sketchy, the lieutenant has left clues that he has seen combat. In one e-mail to his parents, Kerstin and Bob, the younger Gasko told his parents to ask his older brother, Bobby, a former Marine Corps pilot, "what yellow and blue ink make." The reference was to green ink, which is military speak for "how they log their combat time," the elder Gasko said. Lt. Gasko's ship was in the area when the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks occurred in New York and Washington, D.C. Although the Carl Vinson was one of the first carriers on the scene, Bob Gasko believes his son didn't get to fly a mission until the second day of the attacks on Afghanistan. Kris called home on his birthday, three days after the attacks, and expressed concern for his family and friends in America, his mother said. That irony was not lost on his parents, though. "They're out fighting the war and more concerned about us than their own safety," Kerstin Gasko said with a wry smile on her face. Bob Gasko, who flew B-29s over Korea in the Air Force nearly 50 years ago, said he is somewhat concerned for his son's safety. He quickly added that he feels confident about Kris's safe return. The elder Gasko, a retired commercial pilot, served as a Peachtree City councilman during the 1980s. "He has good equipment and good training, and he's a pretty good stick," Gasko said, referring in the latter to his son's piloting skills. "We never lost any sleep," Kerstin Gasko said. Lt. Gasko briefly appeared in a television news report in Norfolk, Virginia about the war on terrorism being staged in Afghanistan. His patriotism shone through in the brief seconds he was on the air: "I fell very fortunate to be a part of what the U.S. is doing to rectify the situation," Gasko told the reporter. While at McIntosh, Kris Gasko received a coveted appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy, but he had to pass up that opportunity after being diagnosed with Hodgkins disease, a cancer of the lymphatic system. He fought the cancer into remission and resumed his interrupted quest to become a military officer. Lt. Gasko later attended The Citadel, a military college in Charleston, S.C., where he became a commissioned Naval officer after graduating in 1996 with a 3.7 grade point average. While the lieutenant's mother and father are proud of their son's role in the war on terrorism, they are also thankful for recent wartime innovations, particularly his ability to read and reply to e-mail while stationed on the carrier. "It has made it a whole lot easier for us," Kerstin Gasko said. "We have a lot of pictures." The e-mails have also been a way for the Gaskos' friends, even those who've never met the pilot, to thank him for his efforts to come to America's defense. "He told me to tell all those people who sent him e-mail how grateful he is," Kerstin said, adding that he didn't have time to reply to all the messages. "It really is amazing how people have wanted to support them." The Gasko family will be making its sacrifice for the war effort when Christmas rolls around: it will be the first time Kris hasn't been home for the holidays. But they won't have to wait too much longer to see their war hero: Lt. Gasko is expected to return to the states in January. "We'll have a late Christmas this year," Bob Gasko said
|
||