Listen: Soldier Accidentally Phones Home During Firefight
Parents receive frightening three-minute message from son in Afghanistan.
May 6, 2008— -- When the parents of soldier Stephen Phillips listened to the message from their son's cell phone replete with gunfire and shouting they feared the worst.
"It made the hair stand up on the back of my head," said Phillip's step-father Jeff Petee.
Phillips had accidentally called home during a firefight in Afghanistan. Having tried to reach his family in Otis, Ore., earlier that day, the phone's "redial" feature was activated as Phillips pressed against the cell phone mid-battle. Mother Sandie Petee found the three-minute message which ended with the words "incoming R-P-G!"
In addition to the chaos and gunfire, what appears to be the soldiers identifying where enemy fire is coming from is also heard. "Back in the corner," someone shouts. Moments later, "We need more ammo."
"The tape cuts off with 'incoming R-P-G!' so we started calling him and finally got a hold of him and found out that he was ok and that they survived," Petee said.
Petee's daughter's fiancée is also a soldier though he is posted in Iraq. "I definitely think all the soldiers over there are heroes," he said.