US soldiers were “doing overwatch” on a village in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, when they started taking machine-gun fire.
Most of the unit got pinned down — that is, they already had cover — but the soldier on point was stuck out in the open, heading downhill.
He didn’t start his helmet camera until a few minutes into the fight:
He took four hits, but nothing penetrated his body armor — or his helmet. He did lose his eye-pro though, and a round punctured the tube of his grenade launcher.
I can’t say I have any great advice for a soldier caught on a rocky slope, taking machine-gun fire, but a few things do stand out: (1) I doubt his semi-aimed return fire did much to suppress the enemy, and (2) while the body armor obviously helped, it’s hard to move in the mountains carrying that much weight.
(Hat tip à mon père.)