Tragedy, devastation, suffering and loss may be the prevailing moods in Oklahoma, where recent tornadoes have torn apart a whole community of 41,000 and left dozens dead and more than 100 injured. But among the debris now hangs an American flag.
It belongs to retired U.S. Army Sgt. Troy Gamble, who’s taken the flag with him on deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, around the globe on various trips — and now, to his hometown in Oklahoma, to the spot where his house once stood, The Blaze reported.
“Everywhere I go, I’ll take it and I would hang it up somewhere,” he told Fox News, adding that the flag has flown in war zones and hurricane disaster areas around the world. Mr. Gamble said he watched the tornadoes rip his hometown and other spots in the Midwest from a safe distance, on television. But once the initial danger reports died down, he returned home — only to find it in a heap.
And that’s where he hung his flag, a symbol of hope in “chaos and mayhem,” he said in the Fox News interview.
“To come home to that, you pick up what you can pick up,” Mr. Gamble said. “You thank God that he has another plan for you because I normally wouldn’t been at the house at that time, and if I had been, I wouldn’t have been here right now.”
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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