WIVB A Marine from the Southern Tier has quite a story to tell. Lance Corporal Jason Hunt cheated death when a car bomb exploded in Iraq. The big blast was caught on tape. It is an amazing act of heroism, caught on tape; a Western New York Marine on the front line of the fight for freedom in Iraq. To on-lookers it appears to be just an abandoned car, sitting idle just outside Fallujah. But to Marines, every abandoned car is a potential bomb. Western New York native, Marine Jason Hunt, was inside an armored humvee pushing the car out of the way when it happened. The force of the blast threw a CNN photographer traveling with the Marines twelve feet back. Amazingly, Hunt who inside the humvee right next to the car when the bomb went off, walked away unharmed. Lance Corporal Jason Hunt: "I was pretty close, I consider myself lucky."

KATU 2 NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq - A few Marines from Dragon Platoon survived an improvised explosive device while moving an abandoned vehicle from an important main supply route from Fallujah to Baghdad. After finding the suspicious vehicle, the Marines eventually used an armored Humvee to push the car off the side of the road. As Marines were securing the area, the vehicle suddenly exploded while a CNN crew was videotaping. The Marines believe it was detonated remotely by an insurgent triggerman who was watching and waiting for the right moment to injure or kill as many U.S. troops as possible. In this case, nobody was seriously hurt. The blast blew CNN Cameraman David Allbritton back 12 feet. CNN Reporter Alex Quade said, "I saw he (Allbritton) was okay and I picked up my mini-cam to help record what was happening in front of us." Immediately after the explosion the Marines climbed into the flaming Humvee to get ammunition out because the ammo could blow and cause other casualties. One of the lucky Marines, Lance Corporal Jason Hunt, told CNN that he thought he was going to die when the car exploded, then he immediately walked away from Quade to begin securing the area. The explosion did not deter the Marines from their security duty; they were all out on patrol hunting for improvised explosive devices the next day.

Posted by: 2005-03-29