Heroes

Aug. 7 (UPI) — Six soldiers at Fort Stewart, Ga., were honored Thursday with medals for their actions after a sergeant opened fire, shooting and injuring five fellow soldiers on Wednesday.

Officials said Sgt. Quornelius Radford, 28, shot his co-workers in the 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team with his personal handgun. The Army post was placed under lockdown at 11 a.m. Wednesday. It was declared “all clear” just before 2 p.m.

Some soldiers disarmed and tackled the shooter, while others rushed to try to save the victims. Two victims are still hospitalized Thursday. Their names haven’t been released.

The six honored were awarded the Meritorious Service Medal.

“We’re going to take a moment and thank these six soldiers,” U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll said. “Under duress and fire, they ran into battle to the sound of the gunfire, took down the assailant, and then took care of their comrades, and that made all the difference.”

“They were unarmed and ran at and tackled an armed person who they knew was actively shooting their buddies, their colleagues, their fellow soldiers,” Driscoll told reporters Thursday.

Those honored were: First Sgt. Joshua Arnold, Staff Sgt. Robert Pacheco, Sgt. Eve Rodarte, Staff Sgt. Melissa Taylor, Master Sgt. Justin Thomas and Sgt. Aaron Turner.

Turner, of Farmington, N.M, was the first to subdue the suspect, with Thomas from Kingwood, Texas, helping to keep him restrained, according to the Army.

Pacheco, Rodarte and Taylor are combat medics.

All five victims were expected to recover, Army Brig. Gen. John Lubas said. Two of the injured soldiers were taken to a trauma center in Savannah, and three were treated at the Winn Army Community Hospital on the post. One underwent surgery.

“Our priority focus is first caring for our injured soldiers and their families and also supporting the soldiers of the Spartan Brigade,” Lubas said.

“When we spoke to the surgeons in the hospital, it was clear that the actions [the medics] took, primarily stopping that bleeding before they were loaded up into ambulances and quickly evacuated to Winn Army Medical, certainly saved their lives,” Lubas said.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution told Turner’s story. He said, “We were trying to make sure we locked everything down, securing it. And then the next thing you know, he ended up walking through.”

Turner said he began talking to Radford “to try and de-escalate him.” He said he knew him, but not well.

“I had never seen any signs of him being out of character or anything,” Turner said.

When Turner approached him, Radford told him, “Go home.”

Radford told him this didn’t have anything to do with Turner or other soldiers, “that it was pretty much leaders” he was after.

At some point, Turner said Radford tried to reload the pistol, and Turner grabbed the gun’s barrel and kept it aimed toward the ground until Radford could be subdued with help from others.

Thomas helped restrain Radford, giving Turner the ability to take the gun away.

“I was able to disarm him, drop the magazine and eject the round,” said Turner.

Being his coworker makes it difficult, he said.

“Knowing the fact that it’s a teammate, it never ends up getting to the point where you really process that,” Turner said.

Radford’s father, Eddie Radford, 52, who lives in Jacksonville, Fla., told the New York Times late Wednesday that there were no signs that he noticed to cause concern before the attack.

“It’s hard for me to process,” he said.

He said his son was seeking a transfer from Fort Stewart and had complained to his family that he had experienced racism at the post, where he had been stationed for several years.

Radford, who is Black, sent a text message to his aunt on Wednesday morning which “said that he loved everybody, and that he’ll be in a better place because he was about to go and do something,” Eddie Radford said.

He had not seen the message himself, he said, but it was described to him by the aunt.

President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House the “entire nation is praying for the victims and their families,” calling the suspect “horrible.”

“Today, a cowardly shooting at Fort Stewart left five brave soldiers wounded,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said. “Swift justice will be brought to the perpetrator and anyone else found to be involved.”

Radford, who is in a civilian jail, will likely be transferred to a military detention center, said Ryan O’Connor, Army Criminal Investigation Division special agent in charge. O’Connor said Radford is in custody and that CID is working through the Uniform Code of Military Justice processes, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

Radford had a recent arrest for driving under the influence, Lubas said. The arrest was “unknown to his chain of command until the (shooting) occurred.”

About 8,800 people live at Fort Stewart, in Hinesville, about 40 miles southwest of Savannah.