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Army Sgt. 1st Class Dustin Ard, his wife, Mary, and their young daughter. | Courtesy GoFundMe

The following is a news release from the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation.

IDAHO FALLS The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation, named after a fallen 9/11 firefighter, announced Friday that the mortgage on the home of Army Sgt. 1st Class Dustin Ard has been paid in full.

This announcement comes exactly three months after the Foundation first promised to pay off the familys mortgage.

Sgt. Ard, 31, was on his third deployment to Afghanistan when he was killed in the line of duty on Aug. 29.

RELATED | Green Beret from eastern Idaho killed in Afghanistan

He left behind his pregnant wife, Mary, and their 3-year-old daughter, Reagan.

I would like to thank Mr. Frank Siller and the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation for paying off the mortgage on our existing home, said Mary Ard. On August 29, 2019 we lost the love of our lives during combat operations in Afghanistan. Our daughter Reagan, our unborn son and I will always have an empty place in our hearts because of the wonderful man we lost. Without the Tunnel to Towers support, I dont believe I would be able to stay in the house my husband made a home. This is the home where Reagan would help daddy with his woodwork projects. Dustin and Reagan would plant flowers around the yard for me to enjoy. Dustin placed neon stars on Reagans bedroom ceiling that says, Daddy Loves You. This is the place where we took our daughter camping. We found out we were having a son in this home. How could I leave the home where Dustin made lasting imprints on? I have been amazed at the outpouring of love and support from family, friends, the Special Forces Community and the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation. The most important thing to Dustin was his family and taking care of us. To know we are (continually) being taken care of, I know he is truly grateful for. I am grateful that as a nation, you have supported this worthy cause. I wish I could thank you each personally for your generosity. But, in all honesty, I wish I didnt have to experience this level of support and would trade it all in for a pup tent just to have Dustin back.

RELATED | Charity pays off home of local Green Beret killed in Afghanistan

There is nothing we can do to heal the loss Mary and her children will feel this Christmas, said Foundation Chairman and CEO Frank Siller. My hope is that this gift of a mortgage payoff will provide the Ard family with some peace of mind ahead of the holidays.

This is the sixth home in the Foundations Season of Hope, during which it will give away a home every day from now until Christmas Eve.

The Foundations Gold Star Family Home Program honors the legacy of those who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving our country by providing mortgage-free homes to surviving families with young children. To date, the program has delivered or is in the planning stages of 30 Gold Star homes across the country.

Courtesy photo

Read the rest here:
He was killed in Afghanistan this summer, but this organization paid the mortgage on his family's home - East Idaho News

Twelve-year-old Kabir Hekmati admits he was a little relieved to find Austin a relatively normal place upon his familys arrival to their new home in October 2017.

The Afghanistan native and his family had a layover in Dubai on their way to America. Dubai looked futuristic, according to Kabir, and it overwhelmed the boys with its riches and technology. If this is what Dubai looks like, Kabir thought, how fancy and disorienting will America be? Turns out, not too intimidating.

The early days were tough, as one would expect, but the charming Kabir and his brothers, the joyful Komel, 9, and the cool Kamal, 14, adapted surprisingly fast. Soccer has a way of springing over simple language barriers.

The boys, their parents and baby sister, Mehr, now 3, fled Afghanistan in 2017 after the work of their father, Ahmad Kambiz Hekmati, for foreign aid organizations connected to the U.S. government brought threats and intimidation from the Taliban.

The Hekmati family is part of the Statesman's Season for Caring program, which helps hundreds of families each year through local nonprofit agencies. This year, the community has donated a little more than $100,000 to the 21st Season for Caring, which launched Sunday. Donations still are being matched by the Sheth family through Dec. 14.

The Hekmati family was nominated by Interfaith Action of Central Texas, which has called the dedicated Hekmatis a model for newly resettled refugees.

As Kabir snacks on a pizza lunch he prepared for himself and Mehr climbs around on the couch jabbering along with cartoons in her American accent, its hard to believe the children have only been in Austin for two years.

Ahmad Kambiz Hekmati, who is looking for work in accounting while working a corporate security job in the evening, admits he and his wife, Maria, were surprised by how easily the boys adapted to life in America, making friends in their school and extended immigrant community. Not long after arriving, the boys were teaching their friends basic phrases in their native Dari language while picking up a few words in Spanish.

"My advice always to the kids is to be a hard worker and smart worker, to be honest and to be loyal," he said.

As is often the case with oldest children, Kamal has taken to serious things, deciding a year ago that he eventually wants to become a doctor. He put aside the clarinet and guitar a year ago as he entered Eastside Memorial High School, but music stayed in the family. Supported by a selective mentor program at Interfaith Action of Central Texas, Kabir started ukulele lessons and wants to expand his repertoire to include the guitar.

Not to be left behind, Komel, who on one visit sported an Austin school district T-shirt proclaiming "All Are Welcome," recently starting playing the ukulele as well.

The boys go fishing with their father on the weekends, but otherwise their time with him is limited. Their mother uses the familys sole car to attend English and high school equivalency classes in the daytime, and their father leaves soon after she gets home midday to go work until late at night. The brothers hope their father can soon find daytime work in the accounting world, so that they can spend their evenings together as a family.

"Family is very important to us," Ahmad Kambiz Hekmati said.

The family has received very little on their wish list. The biggest need is a better job for Ahmad Kambiz Hekmati. They also need sheets and comforters for the bunk beds their children share; kitchen items, including a blender, pots and pans; a dining room table and chairs; laptops or iPads for the childrens studies; a gently used car; ukuleles and a guitar for Kabir and Komel; and gift cards to H-E-B and Walmart.

To find out more about the Hekmati family, contact Interfaith Action of Central Texas at 512-386-9145, interfaithtexas.org.

The rest is here:
Austin not as weird to family from Afghanistan as it could be - Austin American-Statesman

Family hopes to bring dog home from Afghanistan

Kimberly Kuizon reports

Sydney Eicher of Palmetto waits with her newborn son to hear any news from her husband, Joe who is serving in the Army.Lately, their conversation is about a dog named Ragnar.

"They were on a mission and they went to this house and dog was in really bad shape," Eicher said.

She says her husbands unit found Ragnar tied up in a compound while on a mission in a remote area of Afghanistan.

One soldier, Sergeant First Class Josh Lott, traded rations for the dog.

"He had a lot of fleas and stuff, Eicher explained. He was really malnourished. They had to do a lot to get him back to health. They didnt think he was going to make it.

They took Ragnar back to their remote outpost, where soldiers worked together to nurse him back to health.

"He's become a friend, she said. A little supporter. They all look up to him when the day is over... Out there its hard and they have this tiny friend running around keeping them company and giving them light in the day.

Soon, Sergeant Lott will head home, and wants tobring Ragnar with him.After learning it would cost $6,000 to bring the dog to the U.S., the soldiers raised money online. After FOX 13 aired their story, they quickly met their goal -- helping Ragnar get to his new home with his fellow brother.

"They're taught to not leave anybody behind and this dog is now one of them," she said.

Excerpt from:
Dog rescued in Afghanistan may get new home in the States - FOX 13 Tampa Bay

Recently, when traveling east to Vietnam, Air Force One stopped in Qatar for gas, but only did so after gassing up in the United Kingdom first. This brings into question how a direct flight to Afghanistan is possible?

Even the most direct route from the UK to Vietnam is substantially shorter than the distance from Washington D.C. to Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. And in the case of the Vietnam trip, a similar route over the Caspian Sea wasn't taken, one through the Middle East was instead, which is substantially longer.

I have never heard that aerial refueling was part of Air Force One missions to the war-torn country, but it may be a detail the Air Force doesn't see a reason to delve into deeply. As for future missions, from what we have gleaned, the future Air Force One aircraft, the VC-25B based on the 747-8i, will actually have less range than the VC-25As that currently execute most of the Presidential airlift missions. This is counter-intuitive because the 747-8i is capable of greater range than its 747-200 forebearer, but if the official information is indeed accurate, modifications to the 747-8i airframe will substantially offset its enhanced long-range capabilities, dropping the design requirements from 7,100 miles to 5,800 milesboth of which are already less than the current VC-25A's stated and demonstrated range. And of course, it is worth noting the aerial refueling capability has been eliminated from the VC-25B requirements entirely.

So, there you have it, another cloak and dagger Presidential airlift operation is in the books. It won't be long until an entirely new pair of jets take over these historic operations, but a C-17 with some blue first-class seats bolted onto her cargo floor will remain timeless, at least for the foreseeable future.

Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com

Continued here:
What Aircraft Snuck Trump Out Of Florida On His Way To Afghanistan For Thanksgiving? - The Drive

The sky-rocketing prices of onion has forced the Union government and traders to import the vegetable from foreign countries such as Egypt, Turkey and Afghanistan.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her reply during a discussion on supplementary grants, informed the Lok Sabha about the various measures taken by the government to deal with the rising prices of onion. She said there had been a fall in the area of onion cultivation and shortfall in production. There are also several structural issues related to storage and the government is trying to address them.

While the price of onions has crossed 100 per kg because of shortage, the Minister said, Steps taken by the government to check the rising price include ban on exports, imposition of stock limit, import and transfer from surplus to deficit area.

The state-run trading firm MMTC has placed another onion import order of 4,000 tonnes from Turkey and the shipments are expected to reach by mid-January.

This is in addition to 17,090 tonnes of onions already contracted, which includes 6,090 tonnes from Egypt and 11,000 tonnes from Turkey, it said in a statement.

MMTC is importing onions on the behalf of the government, which is trying to check prices of the key bulb by improving domestic supplies through various modes, including imports.

Around 10 to 15 trucks carrying onion from Afghanistan are arriving every day through the Attari-Wagah land route in Amritsar with the price of the key kitchen staple going through the roof.

Daily 10-15 trucks laden with onions are arriving from Afghanistan, said Anil Mehra, Federation of Karyana and Dry Fruit Commercial Association on Wednesday. Each truck carries 35 metric tonne of onion.

Though the trade between India and Pakistan through the Attari-Wagah land route remained suspended, trucks carrying onions continue to arrive from Afghanistan through this route under a bilateral transit trade agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Onion prices reached all time high of 140 in several states including Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Assam and Odisha.

In Chennai, onions from Egypt have started arriving at the market, but in small numbers. This has not helped in controlling prices. Moreover, the quality is not good. The mismatch between demand and supply has seen costs escalate, traders said.

One kg of small onions is priced up to 140. Traders expect the price of onions to come down to 40-50 a kg only around Pongal, when a fresh crop is harvested and arrivals at the market begin to increase.

The Assam Assembly was informed on Wednesday that onion will be imported from Egypt and Turkey to improve the domestic supply of the staple and control its prices. Onion is now selling at 100 to 110 in the retail markets in the State.

Amid the onion prices soaring to 120 a kg in open markets of the State, the Odisha government sought to provide succour to people, saying the cost of the vegetable bulb is likely to decline by January first week after production of new crop.

While the onion price in the open market was around 90 a kilo on Tuesday, it registered an overnight jump by 30 in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack.

The price of onion will come down by December end or by the first week of January, said Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister R.P. Swain.

He said the onion is being procured from other States like Maharastra and Andhra Pradesh as the production of the vegetable bulb here is not adequate.

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Egypt, Turkey and Afghanistan come to the rescue as onion prices leave India in tears - The Hindu