Maine Vol.FF Killed in Mosul, Iraq

[Guest hoss]

Sadly, another of our own has fallen. Prayers and thoughts are with Volunteer FF Tom Dostie's family and friends in Somerville, Maine.

Tom Dostie's father Michael Dostie is Chief of the Somerville Fire Dept.

Town mourns soldier

By MECHELE COOPER 

Staff Writers 

Copyright © 2004 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.   

 

SOMERVILLE -- A crowd stood in eerie silence outside the Somerville Fire Station to honor a local firefighter, friend and son killed in a faraway war that suddenly felt all too close to home.

But for the families who gathered in this town of 500 to pay their respects to Somerville native Tom Dostie on Wednesday night, that silence cloaked powerful feelings of sadness, shock, fear and anger. 

"The families who have soldiers in the 133rd are on autopilot right now. It's a feeling of helplessness," said Ronald Cyr, family friend and neighbor of the Dosties who also has a son in Mosul, Iraq. "Another two months and I hope it will be over. I don't watch the news anymore. I catch the weather then turn it off. And I don't look at the newspaper." 

Family friends Raymond and Kari Brown said they coordinated Wednesday night's candelight vigil to support Michael and Peggy Dostie, whose youngest son -- a specialist in the Army National Guard -- was killed Tuesday in an attack on a military base in Mosul. 

Firefighters came from departments in Jefferson, Whitefield, Windsor, Coopers Mills, Washington and Somerville. Just after 6 p.m., a dispatcher came over the station's loudspeaker with a special broadcast offering condolences for the family. 

An idling fire engine whirred softly in the background as husbands and wives, friends and neighbors stood in a circle, silently lighting white candlesticks. 

The station parking lot along Route 17 offered just enough space for the impromptu vigil, which drew about 80 friends, family members and fellow volunteer firefighters. 

Michael Dostie, chief of the Somerville Volunteer Fire Department, and his wife, Peggy, received guests at the brief event. 

Some offered hugs and words of support. Others said nothing, but simply held Peggy Dostie in long, tearful embraces. 

After a moment of silent reflection and a few short prayers, Michael Dostie thanked the crowd for coming out and remarked about the overwhelming support his family had received all day in an outpouring of calls and visits. 

"I'd really like to thank everyone for coming," he said. "It's just been unbelievable. Thank you, everyone." 

Earlier Wednesday, neighbors stood in the road talking to news crews after Dostie's fate was made public by the governor's office. 

Cyr said people had started calling the Dosties on Tuesday night, bringing over food and sending their condolences, he said. 

"(The Dosties) have given their whole life to the community," he said. "Mike's the fire chief and they've been foster parents for years. Those were the values they instilled in Tom. He was a very good-hearted person." 

Cyr's two sons, who grew up with Dostie, also are with the 133rd Engineering Battalion, also stationed at Camp Marez. 

The battalion, one of two Maine National Guard units in Iraq, was mobilized last December. 

Cyr said his son Ronald, 27, had just gone off duty when the bomb exploded in the mess tent. His oldest son, Jason, 28, was on a mission at the time. 

Daniel Bearce, who lives two houses down from the Dosties on Frye Road, said he had only just heard that his son-in-law -- Jacob Mathews, 21, of Whitefield, who also is stationed at the Camp Marez -- was alive. 

"We were all shook up last night when the two military guys came down here (to inform Dostie's parents of his death)," Bearce said. "Yesterday was a 48-hour day." 

Bearce and other relatives of soldiers bristled as they described what even they knew -- that eating at the mess tent made them easy targets for attacks. 

Bearce said the Cyrs, the Dosties and his own family had been sending food packages to their relatives to keep them out of the mess tent. 

Soldiers had described to them how it was dangerous to eat there, saying that if they had to go into the tent, they went mid-morning or mid-afternoon, when there wasn't a crowd. 

"They would grab something and get the hell out of there," Bearce said. 

At Erskine Academy in China -- where Dostie graduated high school -- the phones started ringing early Wednesday afternoon. 

Doran Stout, the school's athletic director, grabbed a yellow sheet of paper and picked up the phone in his second-floor office. 

Stout glanced at the list of phone numbers printed on the paper and began calling teachers, consoling those who had just heard the news. 

His first two calls went to Dostie's former adviser and his former math teacher, respectively. Both were devastated and in no condition to talk, Stout said. 

A couple of buildings away, in the school's weight room, wrestling coach Pat Vigue looked stunned. 

"It's almost like I knew it when I read that headline -- I was gonna know one of them," said Vigue, who coached Dostie. 

In the next town over at the Hussey's General Store in Windsor, Dawn Vigue of Whitefield said she knew Dostie. He was a friend of her daughter, Natasha, and her daughter's boyfriend, Brad Bowden, of Whitefield. 

Vigue said Bowden, a member of the 133rd, was with Dostie when he died. 

She said Bowden called Vigue and her daughter from Iraq after the attack and told them the bad news. 

"Brad was the one who pulled him out of the tent," Vigue said. "What he said to me is that he tried and tried to save him, but there was just nothing he could do. That was his friend. I just wish he was still here." 

She said soldiers who have been home on leave have told her that the situation in Iraq is 10 times worse than what is seen on television. 

Vigue blamed the military for the deaths and injuries in the Camp Marez attack. She said workers were slow in building a fortified dining facility that would have replaced the mess tent. 

"None of this should have happened," she said. "That building should have been built a long time ago." 

Another shopper at Hussey's, Mary Durgin of Somerville, teared up when she talked about Dostie. Not only was she upset with the news of Dostie's death, but her son, Keith Durgin, 18, who went to school with Dostie, is soon to be sent to Mosul with an Army tanker unit. 

"When my son got his orders, he said not to worry, that the area had been cleaned up and it was safe. Not anymore." Durgin said. "I signed late entry papers for my son when he was 17. I sent him off thinking that they'll take care of him, but they're not. He'll have a nice scholarship when he gets out, but it isn't worth it." 

Capt. Michael Mitchell, commander of Company C of the 133rd Battalion, said soldiers in his company were doing as well as could be expected. He had three soldiers injured in the attack, but expects each to fully recover from their wounds. 

"Today was a tough day, as all my soldiers knew the solders who were injured or killed in the explosion," Mitchell said in an e-mail to the Kennebec Journal. 

Mitchell said soldiers were shocked by what they saw Tuesday. 

"As prepared for a mass casualty incident as we think we are, nothing prepares you for what you might see," he said. "I'm sure my soldiers who were in the dining facility at the time, as well as the ones who responded to help out, will never forget it. We are all anxious to finish our work here and get back to our families." 

Cyr said each incident this past year in Iraq has brought the war closer to home. 

He's just waiting for his sons to come home.