Iraq War Veteran Rusty Ouart will finally get his Purple Heart. The North Dakota Congressional Delegation announced Friday, Dec. 1, that Ouart, who suffered a Concussive traumatic brain injury and shrapnel wounds from a mortar attack, will receive the medal.
Ouart is a former law enforcement officer in Frazee. He is also a 1982 Frazee High School graduate, where he participated in football and wrestling.
Ouart enlisted in the United States Navy and after recruit training in San Diego; he completed Navy school and graduated in the top 1 percent of his class at Naval Aviation Air Crew Candidate School, (NACCS) Pensacola, Fla. He was then automatically transferred to the Navy’s top Search and Rescue School located in Pensacola.
He re-enlisted in the North Dakota National Guard in 2006 after events of 9-11. He then attached to the ND 191st MP Company, and later deployed in 2007 to Iraq to be selected to a down-sized unit of approximately 20 members with select specialty’s under Germany’s 18th Military Police Brigade 95th Division.
Ouart was stationed with this new 95th Germany Command Unit in the Iraq war zone of FOB Rustahmyah, known for the constant barrage of incoming sniper and mortar attacks on a daily basis.
His first Army tour of duty ended with a concussive bomb blast in May of 2008. After being hit by what was later determined to be 2 X 155 rounds of mortar enemy fire hitting the female latrine, which Ouart was in direct contact with while he had movement on the Forward Operating Base of Rustamyah.
A month of medical difficulties, Ouart was being moved to another base in a June as part rotation of a troop movement. Ultimately, Ouart passed out while in the back seat of his Humvee doing mission into Sadr City, Iraq. He was air lifted from there to medical facilities in Baghdad, and after further observation, it was decided to airlift him out of theatre to Landsthul, Germany.
Ouart was flown back to Washington, D.C., and later moved to Fort Lewis, Madigan Hospital and Wounded Warrior Transition Unit, June through January 2008-09.
At Fort Lewis Army Base, Tacoma, Wash., medical staff struggled to diagnose him as he suffered debilitating headaches, vertigo, short-term memory loss and constant fatigue. Ouart was retired in 2009, and the U.S. Army military processed him and sent him to his 191st unit in Fargo, Melissa Seitz, Ouart’s volunteer patient advocate, said earlier.
“They’d worked on his diagnosis for eight months,” she said.
His symptoms hounded him after he reunited with his family. Doctors at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Fargo, N.D., Sanford Health in Fargo, and doctors at Louisiana State University, New Orleans — where Rusty was doing HBOT dives to work with the brain swelling and blood flow — worked with Dr. Paul Harch, leading HBOT specialist in the United States. Doctors said symptoms suggested Concussive Blast Traumatic Brain Injury.
Over 17 pieces of shrapnel also were found during his dive under direct pressure in Louisiana and later removed.
In June 2010, Ouart’s case and images were used as evidence of the severity of Concussive Blast injury to not just himself, but to our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan in front of the U.S. House and Senate Committee on Veteran’s Affairs in which Ouart’s scans provided evidence for blast injury in Washington D.C.
Last year, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) advocated on his behalf. Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) began working on Ouart’s behalf when he was still North Dakota governor, and Rep. Rick Berg (R-N.D.) also pressed forward aggressively on Ouart’s behalf for the medal, which is awarded to service members who were injured or killed in combat.
“This validates his injuries,” said Marilyn Ouart, Rusty’s wife. “It’s exciting. We were notified yesterday that there will be an official ceremony in January.”
But the injuries still take their toll.
Ouart is disabled from his injury, and his wife has taken over the family business of selling and installing office furniture.
“The headaches are extreme,” Marilyn Ouart said, adding her husband also has cognitive short-term memory difficulties, and fatigues very easily.
“His brain injury will remain with him now as a constant testament to his combat service. He is competent and is adapting to learn to live with what many of our soldier’s are suffering and that is the most significant wound of our war and that is traumatic brain injury.
“In 2008, at a ceremony in Washington State, Ouart received citation and a CAB award, (Combat Action Badge) for actively engaging or being engaged by the enemy in a combat situation on foreign soil in defense of our nation.”
When under treatment at Fort Lewis in Washington, Ouart suffered kidney failure. Last year, the Ouarts’ home caught fire, by a lightning strike, killing the family pet dog and leaving them temporarily homeless for one year, as they struggled to rebuild.
“It’s been a long and difficult battle for Rusty and his family, but they never gave up,” the delegation members said in a joint statement. “Rusty is a true hero and has shown tremendous strength and resolve.
“We wish him well as he continues on the road to recovery.”
Ouart today nationally and locally advocates strongly on veteran’s rights and advocacy concerning legislation and has been featured both in print and national television media.
His friend, and very close friend of his family, Maria and Scott Hennen, who has written “Grass Root’s, Common Sense Agenda,” features him in the book he authored. He was VIP with Prince Harry in New York’s Central Park the Achilles Race for Wounded Warriors, had dinner with the McCains, and has been on the field with the Minnesota Twins in New York. Has had contact with former president and first lady George and Laura Bush and attended functions with the Wounded with General Huntoon, the superintendent of West Pointe.
He has been on the music stage with KISS, Montgomery Gentry and Jason Aldean, and has been with both White House secretaries Karl Rove and Dick Morris and has been guest on “Good Morning, America” and the New York “FOX NEWS” shows. He also had the privilege of handing out awards on Veterans Day in New York to students with the 9-11 fire chief Battalion Dan Daly, who spoke in Frazee in February 2010.
On Thursday of last week, Ouart and co-writer Terrance Alan just had a song released out of Nashville self-titled “Wounded Warrior.” Country music talent has already inquired about the song’s availability.
Things are moving directionally forward with focus for Ouart these days, including involvement with a big screen movie in which a few co-written original songs will be used in the sound track to the movie “Gold Score,” which is set for future release in approximately 2,000 theaters.
But, every day is still a headache; it is just learning how to adapt to a wound that is not seen but felt every day as with the OIF and OEF wars. TBI is the most significant wound of today’s war. It is also the most silent and unnoticed.
“Stay strong, and keep moving,” Ouart said. “While this blast was severe in nature and I didn’t shake it off unfortunately, it will be a lifelong testament to the great deeds that all of our soldiers in uniform today and for what those of all wars have done.
“I once said in a radio interview that the biggest export a state can ever provide is that of its own people in the form of citizen soldiers who leave our state and go overseas to fight for all of our freedoms abroad. Soldiers are the United States’ biggest and best export around the world today, second to none.”
Pictures are with Prince Harry, Cindy McCain, Heather Mills, Trisha Meili (NY Central Park Jogger)
We at Harch Hyperbarics Inc.
To All who shall see this present,
Thanks and Honor:
To Wounded Warrior, Russell Louis “RUSTY” Ouart
For His service to this Great Nation
The United States of America
February 4TH 2012 will certify that
The President of the United States of America has Awarded the Purple Heart
Established by General George Washington at Newburgh, New York, August 7, 1782
For wounds received in action
Wounded Veteran Awarded Purple Heart as seen on WDay News 6
Fargo, ND (WDAY TV) – A wounded veteran is awarded the Purple Heart. State leaders, family, and friends congratulated the soldier for his hard work and dedication, at a special ceremony.
By: Danielle Miller, WDAY
Rusty Ouart – Purple Heart Recipient: “What I did was so simple, I put on a uniform and take orders and it was mission driven and mission complete.” Watch this historical moment here from WDAY NEWS 6.
Here is a video made by hoedl’s haven productions who wanted to share this humble gift with you: “Rusty Ouart: Recipient of the Purple Heart for Military Merit (02.04.12)”
