Murph: The Protector Page #6

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the patches,

Mike sewed it onto his uniform.

And his teammates told me

he wore it every day, every mission,

just to constantly remind himself

and the guys he worked with

that there was a bigger picture,

the people back home

who they were fighting for,

and the people that suffered

after 9/11,

not to forget.

Operation Red Wings

was a mission to get some

real bad guys out in the Hindu Kush.

Those guys were remote.

They were far away.

It was enemy territory.

And we sent in

Mike, Axe,

Marcus and Danny

to go get their eyes

on the bad guys

as close as possible.

And they...

they went out there

and were out there

for several days.

They were compromised.

The enemy found them,

was tracking them down.

And in a real short

amount of time,

probably just minutes

and hours maybe,

they were in a huge firefight.

I was in Iraq serving

when the call came in...

came in to MNFI,

Multinational Forces Iraq,

at about midnight

that four troops were in contact,

or troops in contact.

And I was told,

"Hey, Dan, those are four SEALs."

I said, "What do you have?"

And he said,

"Well, I'll get you more information.

We don't have any names yet, but

they're in the firefight of their life."

And I went back in, you know,

first thing the next morning.

And sure enough, by that point

the battle had been going on,

raging for hours,

and still not a whole lot of detail.

I was watching television,

the news.

And on the news

it had this picture of,

like, fake mountains.

It was almost like,

drawn on there,

like, you know, like mountains.

But they said that

they were outnumbered

and there's just four men

trapped on the ground

and these guys

are under heavy fire.

And I thought,

"Oh, my God."

And then I went, "Oh, no."

I said, "What's the shot of that?"

At the operations center,

they were following the beacons

and they knew

the guys were there,

but they had no idea

what was actually unfolding.

So I went to work the next day

and somebody came in and said,

"Oh, my God, did you know

there was a helicopter

that went down

with Navy SEALs?"

And I said, "Well,

that happened yesterday."

And she goes,

"No, I heard it today on the news."

And I said, "Oh." And then I started

to get a little bit nervous,

'cause it was like, "Well, that was

two stories I heard."

That Chinook that went in

to get those guys,

the Quick Reaction Force,

was a helo aircraft

full of real American heroes,

real dedicated, talented,

tough people.

People that you want to be out

doing that type of work.

So by the time I got home,

actually, Heather

had called and said,

"Did you hear anything?"

And I said, "No."

So, you know, I was starting

to get a little bit more worried

about it and everything.

And she said that... she said,

"Well, there's a number,

but I'm not married to him,

so I can't get through."

So I said,

"Well, give me the number."

As an aviator,

as a helicopter pilot,

I know how badly

you want to get in and help.

They wanted to start saving lives.

And they were just

totally focused on...

on getting in there despite

what was being shot at them,

despite what was around them

or who was in front of them

or to the side of them.

They go and they do the work.

And I knew something was up

because when I called California,

all I said was,

"My name is Maureen Murphy.

I'm calling about my son Mike."

And I kept getting pushed.

And then it was like... you know,

like put onto somebody else.

Then I knew... "Oh, my God,

I didn't even give

any other identification other than

my name and Mike's first name."

And then I had a feeling, "Oh, my God,

he's involved in this," you know?

Heather came down

and asked, you know.

And I said,

"Look, he's in Iraq."

I said, "He just sent me

a picture

for Father's Day

of him and his team."

I said, "And there were mountains

in the background,"

I said, you know, so...

but it looked like desert.

I said, "They're in desert fatigues."

I said, "He's in Iraq."

And she said, "Yeah, but what about

those mountains there?"

Dan got an e-mail

on Father's Day from Mike.

And I got an e-mail from him

and I said, "Well, thank God."

Because he said, "Mama, I'm back,

but I've been away for a while.

I'm sorry I didn't keep in contact,

but everything's okay.

I really like it here. And I got some

really funny stories to tell you

and some sad ones too."

One of my friends

is a county attorney.

His name... Tony.

And he's a reserve lieutenant colonel

in the Army.

And he's been to Iraq

and a bunch of places.

And so he says,

"Oh, how's Mike doing?"

I said, "Oh, he's deployed.

I think he's in..."

I said, "I believe he's in Iraq.

He sent me this great picture

of him and his SEAL team."

And he looks at it and he said,

"He's in Afghanistan."

I said, "No, he's not."

I said, "He's in Iraq."

'Cause I had known

he went to Qatar.

We were like... we didn't really

know what was going on.

But it was getting kind of like

a little bit tense.

And, you know, I said,

"Oh, my God, this is literally

kind of getting me scared,"

you know?

When Heather comes down

and Maureen,

I'm trying to reassure them,

"No, he's in Iraq. Everything's okay."

But in the back of my head, you know,

that little birdie sits there and says,

"Oh, boy," you know,

"Tony told me that's Afghanistan.

Maybe this isn't so good."

Anyway, that night

I went to bed and I just said,

"You know what?

I'm just gonna say my prayers

before I go to bed."

it was almost 12:00.

And I remember saying to John,

"You know what, John?" I said,

"I called about six, seven hours ago."

I said, "We haven't heard anything.

That's probably a good sign."

So I got through

saying my prayers

and as I put out the light,

I heard a car pull up

and I heard four doors closing.

So we parked the car

across the street

in a little parking lot

right outside the house.

And the first thing I notice is

all the lights are on.

And it's pretty late.

It's almost midnight.

But they're awake.

And I thought

that was a good thing,

but it also meant

we had to get to work right away.

And the doorbell rang.

And I told John, so naive,

I said, "John, don't answer it,"

'cause I figured they'd go away.

John answered and said, "Mom,

you probably want to come down here.

There's some guys in uniform

outside."

Took their hats off

and stood back for a minute,

asked me who I was.

And I just said,

"No. No."

And I just did not

want to hear it.

We told her right away

that Mike was missing.

We made sure to not say

that he was deceased.

We didn't know what was going on

out in Afghanistan.

We just got word that he

and the three other guys

were missing and they weren't

in communication.

And Father Coyle...

he was really good.

He stepped forward and he said,

"I'm a chaplain."

He goes, "Mike wasn't

in the helicopter,"

which... I had,

like, temporary relief.

And he said, "He wasn't in

the helicopter. He was on the ground."

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