300 Colorado Guardsmen back from Iraq

The Rocky

Published January 23, 2008 at 2:39 p.m.
Updated January 23, 2008 at 2:39 p.m.

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AURORA — About 300 members of the Colorado Air National Guard came home today, home from the war in Iraq, home to their families and friends.

A crowd at least double that initially waited in a hangar at Buckley Air Base. Some sat in bleachers, waiting with tight expressions and tightly folded hands. Some stood stiffly. It was as if they weren't sure it was going to happen.

But happen it did.

When a World Airways jet touched down, a few hundred were standing outside, cheering loudly, holding American flags that snapped in the brisk wind that chilled the sub-freezing temperature even more.

When the jet stopped, members of the 140th Wing, Colorado Air National Guard came down single file to smiles and hugs and kisses.

One daughter, tears on her cheeks, screamed "Daddy" as she jumped into the arms of her father.

Some held signs.

The returning guardsmen smiled widely as they came down the ramp and into the arms of people waiting for them.

"I'm ready to get him back home," said Vidya, Maksyn, 23, of Falcon.

Her husband, Staff Sgt. Brent Maksyn, 24, had been gone three months.

Four generations of the Maksyn family were on hand to greet the sergeant — his grandparents, parents and a niece and nephew.

Courtney Walsh had been counting precisely the days her son, Jamison, had been away from home for the first time in his life — "51 days and 22 hours," she said.

He missed Christmas at home for the first time.

But Walsh said not so for his birthday, which is Feb. 3.

"We've never spent a birthday apart," she said.

Colleen Sechrest, 36, of Parker, was among the crowd. She and her children, McKenna, 5, and Mitch, 3, were waiting for Master Sgt. Scott Collins to come home.

"He has been gone 60 days — 60 long days," Collins said.

She didn't have anything special planned other than "just being home — and being together."

Lea Gerber, 41, of Broomfield, had plans to take her husband, Sr. Master Sgt. Michael Gerber, out to eat.

"He has been bone three months," she said. "Christmas was really hard. It's just a big sacrifice. The tree's still up. We'll go home and open Christmas presents. It will be our Christmas."

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