Thread by @KamiTheWriter

A year ago tomorrow. I've still barely had time to process. That morning of the Abbey Gate bombing, one of my team's contacts asked for our help getting a female athlete through the gate. We thought she'd entered the airport the night before. 1/
washingtonpost.com/national-secur…

That morning French time, as my teammates in the US were asleep, we learned the athlete had been outside Abbey Gate for nearly 24 hours in the sun w/o water, since the TB had taken her backpack at the checkpoint. 2/

Our airport contacts had said they'd no longer be able to help by this time, but we had to try to get her through to her evac flight. My teammate awoke to my call because his daughter woke first & tossed a stuffed animal to wake him up. 3/

The athlete sent us pictures of her surroundings -- she was in front of the truck pictured in the blast video include with this WaPo article. I have a photo of that same truck from her. 4/

We'd been told she was listed on a different countries last evac flight. But we could see Marines in her pictures. So we also asked her to try to get our message to them. 5/

Miraculously, one of those Marines accepted her phone and talked to me. I can still hear his confused, young voice in our brief exchange. We gave him a message about helping this girl. 6/

And he acted on it. Because of his compassion, that athlete ended up on a flight to American instead of the other country. 7/

But more than that, she was no longer still at that gate when the blast happened. She lived. But I have no idea whether he did. 8/

I already felt like I was living at those Kabul airport gates that week, virtually there, everything centered on that place. To have talked to a Marine at that gate hours before a bomb killed Marines was surreal. I am eternally grateful to him. 9/

Thank you to all who worked and sacrificed to help lives be saved in that awful chaos. Words are never enough. And my condolences too, to the Afghans who lost dear ones in that explosion. #abbeygate #AfghanEvac #FinishTheMission