Soldiers return home

• By SANDY DAVIS
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Jul 15, 2008 - Page: 1A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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At least seven Baton Rouge firetrucks joined hundreds of families and friends who waved flags and carried colorful signs Monday to greet 175 members of the Louisiana National Guard’s 769th Engineer Battalion.

The battalion returned home after  a year of duty in Iraq.

Six-year-old Blaine Barnett, of Prairieville, was one of the hundreds of family members waiting at Louisiana Aircraft next to Baton Rouge Metro Airport for his father, Capt. Joseph  Barnett.

“He’s been bouncing off the walls all day,” said Courtney Barnett, Blaine’s mother.

“He’s told anyone and everyone that he’s seen today that he’s going to the airport to pick up his dad. Everyone at his swimming class this morning just applauded.”

Finally at about 6 p.m. the crowd let out a deafening roar when a commercial airplane with red, white and blue stars painted on its tail rolled down the tarmac next to the hangar where family and friends of the unit were waiting.

On hand to greet the soldiers as they got off the airplane were Gov. Bobby Jindal, Mayor-President Kip Holden, LSU coach Les Miles, and his son, Ben, along with a host of National Guard leaders.

Two companies from the 769th Battalion were deployed for the past year, including the 769th Headquarters Company and the 769th Forward Support Company. Both are headquartered in Baton Rouge.

While in Iraq, the Headquarters Support Company served as a headquarters for other engineer companies deployed from other states by planning, organizing and overseeing missions they performed. The other company performed some of these general engineering missions, including projects such as force protection improvements such as fixing roads, and maneuver enhancement projects to help coalition forces, National Guard  officials  said.

But on Monday, little of that mattered as the soldiers sought out their families and friends in the crowd.

With many of the family members wearing the unit’s blue T-shirts with the names of all of the deployed soldiers emblazoned on the back, it was challenging for the soldiers to find  loved  ones.

“Everyone here with me said I could hug Mike first,” said Ruthie Leming as she waited with a crowd of family and friends for her husband, Chief Warrant Officer Mike Leming, to arrive.

Part of the group waiting to see Leming were members of the Baton Rouge Fire Department where Leming is a firefighter when not on Guard duty. They brought the seven firetrucks as a way to welcome  him  home.