“As a firefighter I strive to improve myself on a daily basis through training and study. During that time he also had been hired as a full-time firefighter for the Mount Vernon Fire Department and was building a family with his wife, Alaina. He returned home and immediately started fire training at Columbus State Community College to earn an applied associate degree in EMS/Fire Science. “Despite my success as a soldier I knew my calling was to be a firefighter,” Swank said. As the youngest soldier in his unit to receive such an award, he soon attained the rank of sergeant and attended a leadership development course. He completed his military service in 2006, but not before earning a Bronze Star with v-device for valor, which he earned for subjecting himself to enemy fire to help a colleague who had been injured. “I knew what the job was, but nothing really prepares you for that experience,” he said, “but it also gave me more appreciation for what veterans in previous wars have done.” As an infantryman, his job was to patrol and do search and seizures. His father had served in Vietnam and his brothers serve in the Air Force and Army reserves.įrom 2003 to 2004 he was deployed to Iraq in the initial push of Operation Iraqi Freedom. “This may have seemed heroic to some, but seemed only natural to me because of my upbringing,” because military service also ran in the family, he explained. “I returned home to tell my mother that I was going to the recruiter’s office to start my enlistment into the U.S. “It was on that day that I decided the direction I would take after graduation, he recalled. He was one of the captains of the high school football team, on his way to being named an MVP and considering college football opportunities when the 9/11 terrorist attacks occurred. A previous event during his senior year gave him a different purpose.
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