Based: Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif.
30th Mission Support Group
Supporting: Operation Iraqi Freedom
Died: May 25, 2009
Fallouja (southeast of), Iraq
Married, 3 children
Gender: Male
Hometown: Los Osos
High School: Hueneme High (Oxnard)
Foreign Country of Birth: Canada
Burial: Los Osos Valley Memorial Park, Los Osos, Calif.
Wolfe and his wife of 34 years, Cindi, who have three children in their 20s, considered the Iraq deployment carefully. He could have retired, but he thought that he needed to go."He said they could really benefit from all his years of training," his wife said. "There was a need for that construction and engineering background."
And having joined the Navy at 17, after graduating from Hueneme High School, she said, he had always retained "a real sense of what it was like to be that new enlisted guy, starting out your career. I said, 'You make the call.' "
Wolfe arrived in Anbar province around Christmastime as officer-in-charge of the area's U.S. Army Corps of Engineers office. He oversaw a group of 59 service members, Iraqi civilians and others involved in $300-million worth of economic development and security reconstruction projects.
On May 25, as he traveled with a convoy to inspect a new wastewater treatment plant, a roadside bomb exploded. He was among three people killed. It was his first tour of duty in the Middle East.
Read the entire LA Times article about Naval Reserve Commander Duane G. Wolfe here. Find more at Military Times, at US Forces - Iraq, and read more about Commander Duane G. Wolfe at Freedom Remembered.
