A 24-year-old Army Ranger from the Lansing area who was to have left Afghanistan in July but had his tour extended 45 days has been killed in fighting there.

Army Pfc. Bradley D. Rappuhn of Grand Ledge and another member of his unit died Sunday after insurgents attacked them with an improvised explosive in Zhari Kandahar, Afghanistan, the Department of Defense said.

"He was supposed to come home in the end of July," said his mother, Roxanne Rappuhn, 53, of Grand Ledge. "But they tacked 45 more days on."

"I'm absolutely proud," she told the Lansing State Journal. "He knew what could ultimately happen to him and it didn't matter to him."

Rappuhn was wounded on Memorial Day and still carried around shrapnel from the attack, his mother said.

She said he was an easygoing young man.

"If he were here right now, he'd be telling me to suck it up," she said.

His family traveled to Dover, Del., for a ceremony Monday marking the return of his body to the U.S.

Meanwhile, American flags lined the street where he grew up, WILX-TV reported.

Rappuhn graduated in 2004 from Grand Ledge High School and played on the bowling team.

"He was pretty much a team player," said his former coach, Tom Braun.

Rappuhn enlisted in January 2009 and served as an anti-armor specialist.

Rappuhn and the other soldier who died Sunday were part of the 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, based at Fort Benning, Ga.

"It's never hit so close to home for us. It was a shock to all of us," neighbor Emily Bartlett said. "He was a very nice person to know. It's really sad it had to happen to him."

She added that the neighborhood was close.

"All of us want to pull together and do something, we just don't know what," she said. "I can't even imagine what it feels like."