116th Engineer Co. returns after 11 months in Iraq

Utah soldiers who have been in northern Iraq, deploying as volunteers last May, returned to Salt Lake City Wednesday in two commercial jets that were showered with water cannons as they approached a sizable crowd of waiting families.

Members of the Utah Army National Guard's 116th Engineer Company logged a quarter-million miles in northern Iraq, driving armored vehicles that were a security shield around overland convoys across an area about the size of Pennsylvania.

About 140 members of the group walked off the plane toward their families, flanked by an honor guard of leather-jacket-clad bikers from the Patriot Guard Riders. Inside an adjacent hangar, members of the Utah National Guard's 23rd Army Band played as families huddled and took pictures; and small children clung to their fathers — and mothers — who have been away. For many in the group, this was their second deployment as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Five members of the group were awarded the Purple Heart for injuries resulting from the most prevalent threat facing soldiers in Iraq: the IED or improvised explosive device.

Spc. Zachary Rinck was one of the five. Ten to 20 years ago, when he looks back, Rinck said it will be the Americans vacationing in Iraq who demonstrate his time there was worthwhile. "They have palaces and palm trees — people will want to go there," he said. "It's getting better daily."

Capt. David Cochran, the unit's commander, gave Rinck's wife, Whitney, and others one of the unit's coins as he greeted family members of his soldiers. Such coins, in the military arena, are not an official military recognition or decoration but are one of the most significant "thank-yous" commanding officers give out.

Cochran said his soldiers' work primarily involved driving three different types of armed and armored vehicles, usually on one-day excursions, to guard military convoys traveling in northern Iraq. The unit also distributed thousands of dollars worth of humanitarian and educational supplies in two villages in northern Iraq last fall.

Maj. Gen. Brian Tarbet, Utah National Guard adjutant general, said seeing the troops return home made for a great day. "After seeing four deployments going out in the past 10 days, this has recharged me greatly," he said.

He said the 116th mission in Iraq is "the most dangerous mission we send people on."

"We've been mobilized, really, since the Olympics. We have great young people. They're greatly qualified."