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Army Captain dies during skype chat with wife
This story is getting stranger. I saw it reported yesterday that he died of a suspected gunshot wound, but according to this report there's no evidence of him being shot or foul play - and that reports of a GSW came from the wife seeing a bullet hole over Skype? That must have been an amazing connection.
I can't imagine how his wife feels after seeing that happen. I guess the only (small) silver lining is that his young daughters weren't skyping with him.
Army investigators say they found no bullet wound in soldier who died during Skype chat
By Associated Press, Published: May 6 | Updated: Monday, May 7, 12:02 PMWASHINGTON ? Army investigators said Monday they found no bullet wound nor evidence of foul play in the death of a soldier in Afghanistan who died during a Skype video chat with his wife.
Capt. Bruce Kevin Clark collapsed while speaking to his wife on May 1 from his base in Tarin Kot, Afghanistan, southwest of Kabul. His wife, Susan Orellana-Clark, has suggested that Clark was shot, citing a hole visible in the closet behind him that she believed was a bullet hole.
Investigators said an initial probe showed no trauma to the body except that Clark broke his nose when he fell forward. Orellana-Clark said he didn?t seem alarmed before he collapsed.
Christopher Grey, a spokesman for the Army Criminal Investigation Command, said Monday that the investigation is still under way.
?But the important thing is that there was no bullet wound, no trauma,? except that Clark?s nose was possibly broken when he fell on his desk, Grey said in a telephone interview.
?We can positively say that Captain Clark was not shot,? Grey later said in a statement.
An autopsy was done Friday but it could take several weeks to get results of toxicology and tissue testing done at that time, Paul Stone, a spokesman for the Armed Forces Medical Examiner, said Monday.
Clark?s family released a statement Sunday describing what his wife saw in the video feed recording her husband?s death.
?The closet behind him had a bullet hole in it,? the statement said, adding that others, including a member of the military who came to Orellana-Clark?s Texas home, also believed it was a bullet hole.
The statement says the Skype link remained open for two hours after Clark collapsed as family and friends in the U.S. and Afghanistan tried to get Clark help. Although it was the night of Monday, April 30, at his El Paso, Texas, home, Clark?s time of death is officially listed as May 1, the date in Afghanistan at the time.
?After two hours and many frantic phone calls by Mrs. Clark, two military personnel arrived in the room and appeared to check his pulse, but provided no details about his condition to his wife,? the statement said.
Despite the trauma of witnessing her husband?s death from thousands of miles away, Orellana-Clark said last week through a statement issued by the family that she and her extended family were thankful that husband and wife ?were together in his last moments.?
Orellana-Clark said the reason for the family statement Sunday on the bullet hole was to provide details of what she saw ?to honor my husband and dispel the inaccurate information and supposition promulgated by other parties.?
Grey?s statement Monday expressed condolences to Clark?s family, friends, and fellow soldiers, saying ?we know this is a very traumatic and difficult time for all involved.?
Reached Monday after the Army issued its statement, Bradley Taber-Thomas, a brother-in-law who has been acting as a spokesman for Clark?s family, said the family had not been officially informed by the Army that a bullet wound had not been found in the captain?s body and had no immediate comment.
Grey said investigators will ?consider all available evidence? before reaching a final determination.
?Although we have not completely ruled it out to ensure a complete and thorough investigation is conducted, we do not suspect foul play in the death of Captain Clark at this point,? Grey said. ?We will continue to keep the next of kin updated as the investigation continues.?
Clark grew up in Michigan and previously lived in Spencerport, N.Y., a suburb of Rochester, his wife?s hometown. He joined the Army in 2006 and was stationed in Hawaii before he was assigned to the medical center in El Paso. He deployed to Afghanistan in March.
Clark?s body was returned Thursday to Dover Air Force Base.
He is survived by his wife and two daughters, aged 3 and 9.
Re: Army Captain dies during skype chat with wife
I can't wrap my head around how it could have taken TWO HOURS for someone to check on him. If this turns out to be true I hope heads roll.
I truly have no clue- but this is the only explanation I can think of as to why it took two hours.
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
i can't speak for everyone, but when my husband was deployed he could call me, but i couldn't call him. if there was an emergency there was a chain of people, starting stateside, i'd have to call who'd in turn have to call people overseas. if it was in the middle of the night in texas, it might have been difficult to get that chain going.
anyway, this story is awful and i hope the details get sorted quickly so that the family can move on to grieve. that sounds awful, but you get what i mean. i wonder where the soldier was when he was talking. skype isn't exactly clear all the time, and i'd be very surprised if someone were able to get close enough to put a "bullet hole" into anything near a military communication center. then again, there's friendly fire type stuff.
Yeah, honestly, I can't imagine who I would call if I were the wife in that situation.
I guess I'd call Rear D but calling them isn't easy. I've called them before and then I had to wait until they found the person I'm supposed to talk to to handle that issue. Then that person calls me back and usually, he wasn't the right guy anyway. He was just calling to get more information to help him find who I was supposed to talk to. I'm not sure what would happen after that but knowing the military, it's more complicated than it needs to be.
So I wouldn't jump the idea that someone fuuked up but that the military is nonsensical as hell.
It is far easier for someone over there to contact someone here than vice versa.
Also, it doesn't read like anything could have been done in this situation, even if they'd gotten there right away.
Click me, click me!
I am just surprised that it took 2 hours to find him because I wouldn't have expected Skype calls to be that private. I was picturing them taking place in a computer lab type place, maybe with cubical wall, where people would have been in and out frequently.
I can see where it would take a couple hours for a civilian here to get a message to anyone in charge over there.
So tragic. I can't imagine how helpless you would feel.
H had a laptop. He could skype/webcam/IM as long as he wanted on his off time and no one would bother him.
Click me, click me!