Daegan Page. (Photo from the FB memorial page.)
A funeral is scheduled for Friday, September 17 in Omaha for the Iowa native who is among the 13 U.S. soldiers killed last month in a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport.
Marine Corporal Daegan Page grew up in Red Oak and Omaha. The flight carrying him to Eppley Airfield in Omaha is scheduled to land this Friday afternoon, according to the tribute page Page’s family established on Facebook. Senator Joni Ernst is from Red Oak and knows the family well. She has talked with Page’s grandmother.
“His family just wanted me to share with everyone just what an exceptional young man he was. His grandma kept saying over and over again: ‘He was an amazing young man,’ and he truly was,” Ernst says. “She emphasized that he went into the Marines. He wanted to serve, so he was a tough Marine, but on the interior, he was just someone who wanted to help. He was very soft-hearted.”
The funeral on the 17th of September will be held at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Omaha. The time and location for visitation will be announced later.
“We just want people to remember that behind every soul that we’ve lost in Afghanistan is a human being that is now gone and a family that is left hurting,” Ernst says.
Ernst says Montgomery County has a long record of military service and sacrifice. Red Oak lost more soldiers in World War II, per capita than any other city in America.