A 19-year-old 101st Airborne Infantry soldier from Lowndes County suffered minor injuries Friday when his sergeant stepped on a homemade land mine in Afghanistan.
Pvt. Russ Hudson received a concussion and had a perforated eardrum but was otherwise in good condition, said father Tim Hudson, who is also Lowndes County”s board attorney.
The New Hope High School graduate was walking through Kandahar, Afghanistan, with another soldier and their sergeant Friday at about 6 a.m. CDT (3:30 p.m. in Afghanistan) when the land mine exploded, severing the sergeant”s foot, Hudson said.
The other soldier received some shrapnel, a concussion and cuts to his head, Hudson said.
Russ Hudson could not immediately be taken to a hospital because of a no-fly order to medical aircraft for non-critical patients.
Army officials called the Hudson family at 4:30 p.m. Friday but could not tell them where or how their son was.
He called Saturday at about 2 p.m. to let his family know he was in a hospital in Kandahar.
“There was not a lot of sleep last night,” his father said.
Russ Hudson received local attention when he came home for 15 days in September and visited a New Hope Middle School class. Seventh and eighth grade English students have written him letters since August as part of a class project this year.
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