With a wide, warm smile and a noticeable limp, Gunnersmate 3rd Class Kenya McCarter, who was wounded on the bombed USS Cole, stepped off of a plane at O’Hare International Airport Monday, headed for his Calumet Park home.
Greeted by television news crews and about a half-dozen sailors from the Great Lakes Naval Training Center, McCarter, 22, said he is looking forward to “taking it easy, nice and quiet” for the next couple of weeks.
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McCarter was given a plaque by the Great Lakes contingent for helping shipmates during the Oct. 12 attack on the U.S. destroyer in the Yemen port of Aden.
McCarter, who wore baggy jeans, a leather jacket and a gray cap, has been recuperating in a naval hospital in Norfolk, Va. He sustained a bone chip in his foot, a broken finger, injuries to his arms and deep cuts on his back and head in the bombing that killed 17 sailors and wounded 39.
McCarter said he was in the weight room when he heard a loud bang and went topside. “I had no idea of what happened,” he said of the first chaotic minutes. He then returned below to help injured shipmates.
“Everyone did what they had to do to get people up,” he said.
McCarter’s mother and sister, who had visited him last week in Virginia, were not at the airport.
None of the sailors greeting McCarter knew him personally because he graduated in 1999, but that made little difference in their enthusiasm for greeting one of “their own.”
“It’s like a big family. We’re all in this together,” said Electronics Technician Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael Hillyard.