Régis Le Sommier was a close friend of Chris Hondros. Together they covered the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan several times. Régis wrote this beautiful article about Chris for the last issue of Paris Match.
I learned the news when I landed in New York. Your picture was all over the CNN airport television screens. You were, they announced, between life and death, hit in the head by shrapnel in Misurata, Libya. Immediately, I pictured you, lying in the back of a pick-up truck on your way to the hospital. I pictured you, your lifeless legs, rolling around in those heavy boots you always wore in the field. Six months ago, those boots were with me every day. Climbing through the Kandahar minefields with the 101st Airborne Division soldiers, I tried placing my feet in your tracks. A crazy precaution when you know that it sometimes requires only a few centimeters to lose your legs, that a mine can also explode where people have already walked. I sometimes walked ahead of you, and it was you who placed your feet in my footsteps. Each time we returned from patrol, we would look at each other and let out a deep sigh of relief. During our five trips together in Iraq and Afghanistan, I imagined a host of tragic scenarios, except the one where I would have to write these words.
