Honor of the men and women who defend our freedom around the world. Tonight i ask do so in honor of those currently fighting, those who are missing, those who have perished, and those who are veterans. Please stand and join me in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Before we started, there are a few people in the audience i would like to recognize tonight. I understand that there is a large group from garys families. Could we ask everyone to stand so that we can thank you all for being here tonight . [applause] melissa also here with us this evening, our congressional medal of honor recipient, robert friend, one of the last surviving tuskegee airmen. Good to have you with us this evening. [applause] melissa thank you so much, we appreciate having you here. [applause] melissa and a very, very special thankyou to lori bakker, sitting right here, the director of the incident hero foundation, who donated the exoskeleton to gary. [applause] melissa so, there are many honorable and prestigious things that we you to do here as employees of the Ronald Reagan foundation, hosting events were sitting cabinet members, hosting debates. Last night we had president george w. Bush here, but for me getting to know and meet our countrys heroes outweighs anything else i have the privilege to do. Getting to know tonights speaker has been the highlight of my career. This event happened because we were looking for speakers who could tie into our interactive. For those who have not seen the exhibition, its a largescale highly immersive exhibit that showcases how Science Fiction can become reality. It shows how modernday technology has been influenced by Popular Culture from the 50s through the 80s, changing the ways that we live, work, move, connect, and play. So, how could we find a speaker that epitomizes this . Craig recommended we ring tonights speaker to the library saying heres a guy literally wearing a wearable robot. What better speaker could we find . In doing research for tonights program, i found this quote from a 2013 article of the company that makes the exoskeleton. It was sciencefiction technology, helping people to walk again who otherwise couldnt. We brought sciencefiction to reality in a short period of time. It feeds us it leads us to tonights guest. Gary linfoot, u. S. Army, retired. He served as a member of the armys elite 160th special Operations Aviation regiment. As we saw in the video just a few moments ago, while conducting operations in iraq is helicopter suffered a catastrophic mechanical failure and crashlanded. As a result of the hard landing, he suffered a broken back and was paralyzed below the waist. He retired from the army in 2010 but continued to serve as a simulator flight instructor. Flash forward to 2013, when he became the First Military recipient of an exoskeleton for home use. By memorial day at 2014 he had completed over 100,000 steps using the device. As we just saw in the video, and of not sure about you, i was in the back room crying, a few months ago he walked his wife down the aisle. As president reagan once said, veterans are the heroes among us, let us resolve to live up to their example. I can do give no better persons example that i would like to live up to. Ladies and gentlemen, gary linfoot, with his wife, mary. [applause] [cheers and applause] gary thank you. Oh, my legs are shaking. [laughter] gary well, good evening. Thank you for joining us. It is an honor and a pleasure to be here at the Ronald Reagan library and have the opportunity to speak with you. I would like to celebrate recognize an old friend who celebrated his 97th birthday last week. [applause] gary hope i look that good when im your age. I would also like to recognize lori baker for producing ok . That film you saw. She did a fabulous job on it. I think it really captures the essence of what were doing. Tonight im going to tell you a story. My hope is that you hear the story of a family that has overcome difficulties and met challenges headon, never backed down, never gave up. Its a story of hope. Its our story. On may 31, 2008, the day the life and lives of my family and friends were changed forever, on that date i have been in the army for 21 years and had been a pilot for 19 years. I had flew in the 160th for 11 years. I had completed one combat rotation and following 9 11 i. As on my 20th rotation to iraq all told, 861 days. I was the senior flight lead, first battalion, and we were known as the six guns. Our mission was to provide Close Air Support for the best special Operations Forces the world had ever known. I was at the apex of my career. There was no other job in the world i wanted. I was in my element and exactly where i needed to be. If you recall, the nation had been at war for almost seven years of that. He had been in iraq for five years. 2008 was the end of a very successful surge. We had broken the back of the enemy and had them on the run. For my family, the constant deployments to iraq for five four or five times the year had become somewhat routine. I would tell my wife and kids goodbye and drive through the compound and be gone for the next 90 days. Missing holidays, birthdays, special occasions, school sports. Life went on at home without me. When i was deployed all i could think about was being home again. When i was home all i could think about was getting back to iraq. I guess in all of those years i never really quite made it back home. But that was our life in 2008. That was the routine. Im going to loosen this up a little bit, because i can hardly breathe. [laughter] gary i call this my girdle. Gets my gut sucked in. [laughter] gary yeah, im good, thank you. That was the routine for us. But this night was anything but routine. 31st of may, 2008, someone ill look at day and completed some pt, like i always did, showered, and walked over to the to preflight to my hsix. I was updated by the crew chiefs on the status of our aircraft and i walked over to the joint Operations Center to get a report on the daily operations of aircraft and a warning on the mission that night. It was shaping up to be a routine night as related to our british counterparts in the joint task force. Around 10 00 we departed for the airbase and headed for a Mission Support site in baghdad. We attended in operations brief. The brits were always fun to work with. Although we share a common language, they were often very difficult to understand, at times requiring people to translate into american for us. [laughter] gary the briefer this night had a very heavy accent, and at the end of the briefing i turned over to my guys and i said a, did anybody understand a word that he just said . Everyone shook their head, no, we did not. But we were able to get good clarification and were good to go. The mission that night was simple and one that we had literally performed hundreds of times. The brits were flying to an American Forward Operating base south of baghdad. There the ground force would link up for American Fighting vehicles and armored humvees and ride to the objective. They would leave the vehicles at the vehicle dropoff and quietly, hopefully undetected, walk up to the objective, where they would surround the target building. Once surrounding the target building, they call out the person of interest, the target that night, the person they wanted to detain, for us it was really low hanging fruit at that point. Now, things got loud, meaning they had the assault on the building and we would be called in to provide Close Air Support. As required, proceeded to our planned holding area. When we took off, i use the power of the heavily laden eggshaped 649. I was loaded with 14 rockets. 800 pounds of fuel. Even at the the maximum gross rate, the 650 horsepower engine easily came to life with a rotor blade turning the hot night air into submission and we left. At 300 feet i called out the departure using the callsign of havoc, and the dogs of war slipped off into the night. Sometime after takeoff, we heard a strange noise coming from the rear of our aircraft. It was a loud blowing noise of sorts. Unknown to us, it was the first and only indication of failure of the engine driveshaft. My copilot and i discussed the sound and, unable to determine the source, with all outfit instrumentation reading normal, no unusual vibrations, we convince ourselves that the heater had opened somehow. We continued our mission. Eventually the noise pretty much all but ceased. June 1, midnight, zero illumination, visibility was three miles with blowing dust, wind out of the north, 20 to 25 knots. We had just arrived in our planned holding area and were at a speed of 70 knots indicated, heading 180. Suddenly there was a muffled but loud explosion and a sort of pop coming from the rear of the aircraft. That connected the driveshaft to the engine, it disintegrated and we lost the power to the main rotor. Immediately we went violently to the left and we fell from the sky. I entered whats called an auto rotation and we put the aircraft the hardleft turn. I scanned the instruments and adjusted the collective control to maintain the rotor in the green while simultaneously making and made a call making a mayday call and picking up the landing area. We were too heavy and falling fast. This was going to be a hard landing. My last memory of the landing was seeing the blur of the ground rushing up through the night vision goggles. I remember hearing the warning of low rotor and seeing the low vidhe rotor rpm on the decaying to red. I told my copilot, greg, to brace for impact. And then we hit. Total time was less than 10 seconds. The impact itself was very surreal. If you have ever been in a violent highspeed automobile crash, you can pretty much relate to what it felt like. After the sound of the aircraft crushing the rotor blades hit the ground and the tail section separated from the aircraft, from the helicopter, and all the lungs leaving our bodies, there was an eerie silence. A fragment of bone at pushed into my spinal cord. Paralysis was instant, i felt my legs fall to the left. I smelled a strong odor of jet fuel. We may be on fire, i yelled that we needed to get out. With my right hand, i grabbed the door frame through the shattered glass and it was at that time i realized they could not move my legs. Then the pain kicked in. Greg had suffered a broken back and concussion. To this day, he has no memory of the crash or the events leading up to the accident. Greg was able to egress and was lying in pain in front of the aircraft. We had missed landing in the water and the canal by only feet. I grabbed my rifle and wanted to boostsignal our signature ship sister ship to say that we were alive and warm and for approaching personnel to stay away. Greg heard the shots and he was knocked somewhat loopy. He thought we were being shot at. He yelled, gary, they are shooting at us i told him it was only me. I stopped shooting. I tried to contact the ship overhead in the embedded radio with no success. There was nothing the darkes nothing but darkness and pain. At this time, i checked my legs hoping to find out they had just been broken. They were both intact. At this point i knew i had suffered a spinal cord injury. Many thoughts and images raced through my mind and they told me the same thing. This was going to suck. After about 10 minutes, my friend appeared out my door and asked if we had been shot down and i said i believed it was mechanical failure. Steve quickly triaged myself and greg, and he radioed the aircraft to get us. In the short time toolbar blackhawks with about 20 rangers secured the crash site. Greg was sent back to evacuate and not wait for the Pararescue Team to cut me out. And i would wait for the Pararescue Team to cut me out. Less than an hour after the crash, which really is remarkable, if you consider everything, less than an hour i was on my way to the first of several hospitals headed to the United States. A nurse handed me the phone and said, go ahead, call your wife. I called mary. Thats me. Gary thats her. [laughter] gary chief of staff. Gary so, mary had just walked in the front door after a long day at the ball field with our daughter when the phone rang and she was surprised to hear my voice. I asked her if anyone from the unit had contacted her. She said no and immediately thought that something bad had happened. My voice was calm and clear and i told her that i had 10 in a bad crash and had broken my back. She was saddened that i would live a life of back pain but relieved that i was ok. I told her that i couldnt my legs. She immediately went into crisis mode and had the frame of mind to tell me that she would talk to the kids that i was ok. It would be a sleepless night for her and the kids. Im sorry. Our son simply asked if this meant if his dad would be heading back to iraq again. Less than 24 hours from his surgery was completed, and i was on my way to Walter Reed Army medical center. The first of three hospitals where i would spend the first three months in recovery and rehab. With mary by my side the entire way, we began our unwanted journey together. Spinal cord injuries are a unique and complex injury. No two injuries are ever exactly the same. The effects of the injuries i had never thought of him but would soon discover. Beyond the loss of movement to my legs there was the loss of bladder and bowel control, loss of sexual function, loss of dignity. Depression is very common, and then there is the pain that never goes away. It is a very cruel injury. In those three months, we moved from walter reed to tampa, florida, into the Shepherd Center in atlanta. All the while, discovering more about the injury and the skills we needed to survive this new normal of being a paraplegic. I was focused on recovery and getting home, while mary was focused on what we needed a we are at home to include all men home and vehicle modifications, special equipment, continued therapy, in the list went on and on. Together, we made a pretty good team. The next year was all about learning the reality of being a paraplegic. Many hours were spent on the phone coordinating with doctors to get things done. We had to learn how to patiently navigate through an immense bureaucracy. In january of 2010, i was medically retired from the army with 23 years of service. It was that summer i began to work as a flight instructor, teaching new aviators to the 160th. Sometime that summer, that time of my life was pretty much a blur of change. I believe i fell into a depression. I definitely know i took out a lot of my anger and frustration on mary. I was angry. And i was ashamed of what i had become. I lost my selfworth as a soldier, as a man, as a husband, and as a father. I had gone from being an elite special operations attack helicopter pilot, the alpha male and leader of remarkable warriors fighting evil, to someone who could do very little for himself. In my mind, i was a failure. I think i did a good job of covering it up. Ive tried to keep a smile on my face and a good attitude. I want to work, joked around, tried to exercise. I tried to cover the pain and do my best not to complain. On the inside, i died a little more each day. This injury was beating me down and it was a death of 1000 cuts. I prayed to god he would take it all from me. I prayed it would just end. I wanted it all to be over. I have been to the edge, stared into the dark abyss. This is what i know. We are all here for a short amount of time, but we are here with and for a purpose. I truly believe that god has a plan for all of us. If it were not true, we would not be here now. I survived the crash because of not because of my superior flying skills, although if you ask me [laughter] gary i will tell you how good i am and how goodlooking. [laughter] gary right . I believe i survived that night because god still has a purpose for me. He is not done with me yet. It is for this reason i chose and my family chooses to continue to fight together. We have never given up. When i told god i cannot do this, it was as if i heard him say, thats right, you cant do this alone. Thats why i have given you your wife and children and family and friends, and you have me. I believe the saying that god does not give you more than you can handle is incorrect. He will give you more than you can handle, but it is with him and through his strength that you will overcome and thrive. Mary and i made a conscious choice to move on and live out our lives to the best. Notverlaid we owei t only to ourselves but to our family and friends. And we owe it to those we have lost. I have been given a Second Chance that many of my friends and fellow warriors did not get. I owe it to those who did not come home to live a life well lived. There have been many difficulties on this path. I will not lie, it has been a tough road. In the end, i believe it will all be worth it. We benefitted from the kindness and generosity of many people, and ive been the recipient of hightech robotic equipment. An optical wheelchair that climbs stairs and balances on to aheels, by lifting me height of six feet. The exoskeleton in which i stand before you tonight. With this equipment, we have traveled to countries, seeing and doing things i never thought possible. Talking to young kids about advanced robotics and hopefully planting that small seed in the mind of a child that will one day blossom into an idea that may change the world and may even one day help end paralysis. We successfully completed an fda trial of the exoskeleton. Its now available for veterans through the v. A. We demonstrated that which not long ago was thought to be impossible. A paraplegic has fundamentally been able to stand and walk again. I was honored to be the first paraplegic to walk around the statute of liberty. Xoskeleton. It was in april 2015, the First Time Since the accident, i was able to stand with mary by my side for the National Anthem in front of thousands of people at a race in bristol, tennessee. Believe me, i will never take for granted the Little Things in life. The Little Things like being able to get out of the bed in the morning and use the bathroom in less than two minutes, or the ability to climb three steps to knock on a neighbors door, or stand and hug my wife and kids. These th