By CHARLES OWENS
BLUEFIELD — Although their flight home took a little longer than anticipated due to complications associated with a disabled aircraft that was blocking the runway at Yeager Airport, the last wave of the Army National Guard’s 150th Armored Reconnaissance Squadron and 230th Forward Support Company was still reunited with family and friends Monday.
Pam Joyner of Bluefield spent most of the day at Yeager Airport in Charleston waiting on the arrival of her son, Jonathan Chase Joyner. The local soldier, a member of the 2007 state championship Bluefield Beaver football team, has been in Iraq since April 19, 2009.
“My son graduated from Bluefield High School in 2008, and he was a big football player with Beaver,” Pam Joyner said. “I’m very proud of him. I asked him last night if he was ready to come home and he said yes. He didn’t have any problems in (Iraq). Things went very smoothly for him. He came out of boot camp on Jan. 23, and he left for training on the 27th. So we got four days notice.”
Although he didn’t make it home in time to watch the Super Bowl with his family, Joyner said her son did get to watch the big game at Fort Stewart with his fellow soldiers.
“I just want to tell him that we are just so very proud of him, and the whole group of boys,” she said. “We appreciate everything they’ve done, and we are glad to have them home.”
The aircraft carrying the soldiers from Bluefield and Welch landed at Yaeger Airport around 3:30 p.m. Monday, according to Specialist Anna-Marie Hizer of the West Virginia Army National Guard.
Although it was originally thought the troops would have to land in Huntington due to a disabled aircraft blocking the runway at Yeager, Hizer said the soldiers were able to land at Yeager after all.
Hizer said about 100 soldiers from the 150th Armored Reconnaissance Squadron and 230th Forward Support Company returned home. Although she couldn’t confirm that the 100 soldiers were the last troops from the two units originally stationed in Iraq to return home to West Virginia, family members assembled at Yeager Airport indicated the men were the last wave of the local soldiers to return home.
— Contact Charles Owens at cowens@bdtonline.com
