It's commonly called the Tarnak Farm incident, a soft name for such a deadly moment in Canadian military history.

On a mid-April night in Afghanistan 10 years ago, an American fighter pilot dropped a 225-kilogram laser-guided bomb on a section of the Third Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry's “A” company, killing four. A catastrophic friendly fire mistake.

The dead, all in their 20s — Sgt. Marc Leger, Cpl. Ainsworth Dyer, Pvt. Nathan Smith, Pvt. Richard Green — never saw it coming. They'd been conducting an authorized live-fire exercise near Kandahar at an old Al Qaeda training base, a place called Tarnak Farm.

There was more carnage. Eight Princess Pats were injured, one severely. Others were traumatized emotionally. Some had both kinds of scarring, the latter often proving more troublesome to heal.

Today, three survivors say the keys to coping with the fallout from that fatal April 17 — the worst Canadian Forces fratricide loss since the Korean War — include remaining in the military and redeployments to Afghanistan.

“I'm a glass half-full type of person, so I'd say it has been very good,” says Edmonton-based Warrant Officer Curtis Hollister, 39, of his upward path through the Canadian Forces since 2002.

“I'm a career military person.”

So are Sgt. Lorne Ford and Warrant Officer Brett Perry, also in Edmonton.

“I'll stay in until they tell me I have to leave,” says Perry.

“I love what I do,” says Ford. “I never wanted to leave.”

The trio are remarkably similar in other ways, too. They think often of their dead comrades; they downplay their injuries from 2002; they are thankful for unwavering military support for their physical, mental and workplace needs. They've all since married and had two children each, with family life central to their happiness.

One more common bond: They don't give disgraced F-16 fighter pilot Harry Schmidt much thought any more.

“He was an idiot. He did what he did and it's over,” says Ford.

Sgt. Lorne Ford's two young sons have never asked why he limps. They don't know he lost an eye, either.

“They may look and notice something is off but for them, that's been daddy since they were born — I limp,” says the Brampton-born Ford, 43.

“When I wear shorts, it's an obvious injury of missing flesh behind my leg and they've asked about that. I say, ‘That's when daddy got hurt overseas, when I was in Afghanistan.' And they're like, ‘Oh, OK.' They don't pursue it.”

Ford knows his boys, who are just starting elementary school, will eventually be more curious. At that point, Ford says he will deliver the “blunt truth” — that the American bomb's explosive power injured his right eye so badly it had to be removed; there was massive soft tissue damage above and behind his left knee; a leg nerve was severed, leaving him with no feeling on the bottom of his left foot.

Ford will limp for the rest of his life. But the injury doesn't diminish the soldier, who also served in Bosnia.

“The desire to soldier is still there,” says Ford, noting for a time it was difficult to accept “not doing what I love to do, which is leading troops in battle.”

“I knew I wasn't going to get back to being a section commander because of the nature of my injuries — that was a no-brainer.”

Ford credits the Canadian Forces for supporting him through his recovery and finding him demanding roles over the years. He is now back with the Third Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry as the unit's embarkation officer, a logistics wizard whose planning skills include the acquisition and movement of vehicles and cargo — some of it dangerous — “with as little hiccups as possible.”

Ford returned briefly to Afghanistan twice to escort families of the fallen, an important duty he values. But he yearned for a longer deployment: “I wanted to go back for years.”

He got that wish in the fall of 2011. Ford was part of a nine-month training mission in Kabul after Canada had officially ceased combat operations. The work was rejuvenating and fulfilling, he recalls. It was also a healing experience.

“I never felt like I really completed anything,” he says of the 2002 tour cut short by the tragedy.

“In my mind, I think I needed to do it.”

While in Afghanistan, the sergeant did not travel to Tarnak Farm. Half a world away, the site still pulls at him, memories strong of “the four guys.”

If the Canadian Forces offered him the chance, would he return?

“If they said tomorrow they were going to bring me right back to the site, I would go in a heartbeat.”

Warrant Officer Brett Perry urgently needed to speak to his old section commander, Sgt. Lorne Ford.

It was Sept. 3, 2008. Three of Perry's men were killed when their Light Armoured Vehicle was hit by a Taliban rocket. Perry, the section commander, was 50 metres away; he saw two gunners ejected, his driver was on fire, his second-in-command lost a leg. More Princess Pats' Second Brigade soldiers were wounded, one critically.

The devastated battle group was just three days from returning home. Perry, distraught, needed an emotional anchor.

“Naturally, the first guy I talked to as soon as I could was Sgt. Ford because he'd gone through that already,” says the Winnipeg native, referring to the Tarnak Farm deaths. In 2002, Perry was a 25-year-old corporal when he was riddled with shrapnel and concussed.

“There were some leaders that I've had in life along the way and he was one of the very first I had. Sgt. Ford was a machine and we all wanted to be like him.”

Speaking to Ford was comforting, recalls Perry, as he grieved the “very best a section commander could want”: Pte. Chad Horn, 21, Cpl. Andrew Grenon, 23, and Cpl. Mike Seggie, 21. Perry worried he hadn't done enough to protect them. Ford reassured him he had.

“Those kids were awesome, they did some very heroic things in the battlefield,” Perry says of the combat mission in the Zhari district.

“Chad Horn saved my life a number of times. He was my gunner, he fired me out of some stuff that was pretty bad. Mike Seggie was fearless. Andrew Grenon ran through fire in order to get us ammo as we were running low on another occasion.”

Perry also faced “pretty bad stuff” away from the battlefield; troubles rooted in Schmidt's decision 10 years ago to disobey orders. The former pilot claimed he acted in self-defence, an explanation rejected by a 2004 U.S. air force inquiry that found Schmidt guilty of dereliction of duty.

“I was just a fallen-down soldier for a lot of years,” says Perry, who was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after 2002.

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He describes himself as “the angry guy,” a frustrated young soldier trying to make sense of Schmidt's actions.

Then Perry sought help. He found relief through Canadian Forces and veterans affairs' medical services. Perry also found peace in religion, becoming a born-again Christian prior to his 2008 deployment.

“I still struggle with a lot of things. But my faith and my wife, Andrea — my wife, especially — stood beside me during the very worst. Without her, I wouldn't be here.”

As for Schmidt?

“I had to release all my anger toward him,” Perry says.

“I just prayed and let it go. God took that particular part from me (but) I know there are some things that he left in me and I think there's a reason for that.”

Perry believes his “remnants” of anguish allow him to help troubled soldiers seeking answers from him the way he sought solace from Ford.

“I have them coming to me now with questions. They're suffering from things that they've seen or done overseas, so I think I'm left with some remnants just to give those guys a hand.”

How does one reflect, almost daily, on four dead brethren without raging at the man who caused their deaths?

It takes time, says Warrant Officer Curtis Hollister.

And over the course of 10 years, he's become proficient in navigating a delicate emotional boundary that separates sorrow for the fallen from anger at their killer.

“I do think about it. I think mostly about the individuals who died but I try not to dwell on the subject,” says the 39-year-old native of Cupar, Sask.

“You never forget the guys or that the incident happened, but it's part of your daily routine. I guess you could say you just learn to live with it.”

Hollister can now dismiss Schmidt as “a nonfactor for me.”

“I've moved on.”

Family has helped. He's fulfilled as a father to two preschool-aged children and husband to “my beautiful wife,” Jenifer.

Hollister says the military has also played a vital role in recovering from his physical and emotional traumas from a decade ago. He was hit by shrapnel after the Mark 82 exploded, suffered burns to his face and neck and was concussed.

“We went over for a mission and I thought it was my duty to complete the mission.”

But it was quickly evident Hollister was not fully recovered: “I was back too soon.”

The battalion directed him to the leave centre in Dubai, where Hollister would greet Canadian soldiers coming off round-the-clock rotations and assist them with administrative or personal tasks. That contact was therapeutic.

“It was good for me on the mental side because when I went back, talking to them and knowing that — what's the word I'm looking for? — I didn't let them down,” Hollister says.

“They reassured me that I was wounded and I think it was a healing process for myself. Working at the leave centre helped me immensely. It enabled me to meet my fellow soldiers from the battalion and helped me reconnect with them.”

Hollister, like Perry, would later be diagnosed with PTSD. Like Perry, he sought treatment (“It worked,” Hollister says) and was supported by his unit.

Hollister was deployed to Afghanistan again in 2005 and 2007. Today, he remains passionate about his career choice. He is now with the First Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry and balks at the suggestion that the decision for him to remain in the military was difficult.

“Why was it important for me to stay? I've always loved the military. I loved being in the infantry. The camaraderie of your fellow soldiers is an important thing for me.”

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