Jason Magnavice

“I got out of the selection process, Green Team, in September of 2001. I remember walking across the compound when we were talking about the planes hitting the towers, and the first thought was, man, ATC must have screwed that up. Then when the second one hit the tower, they took our whole class into a briefing room. Our skipper came in, gave us the brief, and we were like, oh boy. Excited, because we knew we were going to be busy.”

“It's rough growing up as a kid being a Jehovah's Witness. Having to wear a suit, which I still to this day, I don't like wearing a suit, get dressed up in a little suit, little tie, go to the Bible study once a week. And you don't celebrate any holidays. Jehovah's Witnesses, all they do is read from the Bible. Why celebrate certain holidays? Yeah, it makes sense. But it's tough when you're a kid, all your buddies are celebrating.”

“We inserted up on this point, it was jump off the rapid ants, set up our OP site as TF Mountain, it was the 82nd 101st Airborne as they were moving to clear out this valley. And we just called in CAS for a week. And then one night that March 4th... that's when Neil and his team was slabby, a couple other guys, that's when they inserted and got lit up, and where Fifi fell off and ended up dying.”

“I've just heard the stories from Greeno. It's everything a team guy wants to do. Get up at night, eat dinner for breakfast, and then walk out to the birds, go to your work, come back and do it again, maybe all night. But yeah, Iraq was, I think what every team guy at that time, the type of operations they wanted to do, just going out and getting busy.”

“I see this big dude wearing a polo shirt, khaki pants, he's waving me up. Back up, throw the guns in the caravan, C-208, little turboprop for a four-hour flight to Memphis. I'm like, dude, wait, you're freaking flying an airplane? Like you're a team guy pilot right now, flying me to freaking Memphis. Apparently, I had no clue at the time either, but that program was developed back in the beginning, just to learn how to steal airplanes if you had to do it.”

“I'm going through the mail and I open a letter from the FAA. They're like, 'Hey, we see you're a disabled vet. You got to tell us everything that's on your VA letter.' I go through all the testing, and my brain is like fried going through the neuropsych testing. I end up answering questions to a bunch of other guys that are disabled vets that are pilots going through the same thing. Some guys are lying, they got in trouble, they got caught.”

“Just compartmentalize it, stay busy, stay busy. I rebuilt a 93 Mustang in my garage. That was the way I dealt with it. I got back from my first pump in Afghanistan, go out in the garage, work in the car, and motorcycles. I like motorcycles a lot. That's how I deal with it. Keep busy because a stagnant mind is not something that's good.”

“I wanted to be a SEAL since I was 10 Like 1982 when I saw the first Rambo movie. But yeah, when I was in middle school, like, Jay, what do you want to do when you grow up? I said, I want to join the Navy. Nobody knew in the 80s what the Freak of SEAL was, till like 1990 when, well, when Marcinko wrote the book, Rogue Warrior or whatever.”

“It's all over when somebody's got your balls in their hand and they're twisting, man, and you're getting tied up or zip-tied and getting dragged out, freaking shaving your balls, hot sauce on the balls, getting hit with paddles. Yeah, it was... It's stupid, right?”

“And then one night that March 4th, the anniversary just passed. That was, yeah, when Neil and his team was slabby, a couple other guys, that's when they inserted and got lit up, and where Fifi fell off and ended up dying. We helped out a lot. We did, I mean, we supported, you know, the big movement with TF Mountain and whatever, the hundred, yeah, those guys.”

“And he ended up down the road, he was a Master Chief on freaking Neptune's Spear in the Bin Laden up. He's always trying to get back to freaking big guy. I'm trying to get back to the blue, you know what I mean? And I can't right now. And I'm like, dude, wait, you're freaking flying an airplane? Like you're a team guy pilot right now, flying me to freaking Memphis.”

“So I see a great doctor in Savannah, Georgia. He has me go through everything. I go through all the testing, smoke it. I mean, my brain is like fried going through the neuropsych testing, and then I end up answering questions to a bunch of other guys that are disabled vets, that are pilots that are going through the same thing.”

“He was a humble guy that didn't think he knew everything all the time. And if he had any, that's like who I wanted to be like. We respected him. He was a hard worker. He led by example, but he wasn't hard headed. Right. He was just, hey, if he had a quest, he wasn't afraid to ask a question. He wasn't afraid to delegate other people that he knew were better at certain things that he wasn't.”

“Just compartmentalize it, stay busy, stay busy. I like shooting, you know what I mean? I'm in a car, a motorcycle. That's what I do. When I would come back from my deployments, shoot, I rebuilt a 93 Mustang in my garage. That was the way I dealt with it. I got back from my first pump in Afghanistan, go out in the garage, work in the car, and motorcycles.”