"Cali Bagby" News

On just their second day home, soldiers from C/7-158 Medevac made one last appearance in their camo uniforms, well-worn after a year in Iraq. For now family members can rest easy knowing the soldiers are safe from harm -- until the next deployment.

Welcome home, Charlie Company. KVAL.com readers followed their deployment--  from training in Oklahoma through their service in Iraq to their return to the United States -- through the stories of freelance reporter Cali Bagby, who embedded with the unit.

Even as the plane touches down on American soil, their year-long deployment to Iraq is not quite over, so there are no yelps of exaltation when the plane lands. “You are not the same as when you left,” says the chaplain who meets them as they exit the plane.

After the explosion, in the darkness, just a month into their deployment to Iraq, imagine the fear of a soldier, stuck in his seat, unable to move, unable to get to his gunner who is trapped just inches behind him with an injured leg -- and a missing foot.

Caller on tipline says he 'heard explosions in the Glenwood area.' | So began a news story reported with your help -- and told here in three parts: 1. Big Bang theories 2. *shakes fist at the aliens* 3. 'Nothing but a flaming pole'

After 3,000 hours flying missions over Iraq to transport 890 patients and save 375 lives, Oregon's Charlie Company Medevac is coming home from Iraq -- except for those who have volunteered to extend their tour of duty with another unit.

It’s 1 a.m. at the Joint Visitor Bureau Hotel in Baghdad, Iraq. "I was bored, we could take the Humvee out tonight," says gunner Spc.  Kent Patterson, 27, Tualatin, Ore., "There’s no alcohol, so football is the next best thing."

Oregon National Guard medics flew two missions Wednesday from Ramadi, including one with an unidentified high-profile Iraqi patient on board. The military would not confirm whether the patient was the governor of the Iraqi province, injured in an assassination attempt.

Merry Christmas, Sgt. Jason Johnson, 35, of Monmouth, Ore.: His fiance back home in Oregon photographed and scanned every ornament on Johnson's tree back home, and then she sent the photos to Iraq. He recreated his Christmas tree on a bed sheet.

There are no Christmas carols resonating through the halls, and mistletoe would be inappropriate. But soldiers in C/7-158 Medevac stationed in Al Asad and Balad hang tinsel in their offices, watch Christmas movies on their laptop computers and make the best of the holiday season. Here's how.