Michael Joseph Bordelon – First Sergeant, United States Army

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NEWS RELEASE from the United States Department of Defense

No. 466-05
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 12, 2005

DoD Identifies Army Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

First Sergeant Michael J. Bordelon, 37, of Morgan City, Louisiana, died May 10, 2005, at Brooke Army Medical Center, San Antonio, Texas, from injuries sustained April 23, 2005, in Mosul, Iraq, when a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonated near his Stryker military vehicle. Bordelon was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division (Stryker Brigade Combat Team), Fort Lewis, Washington.

For further information related to this release, contact Army Public Affairs at (703) 692-2000.

10 May 2005:

St. Mary Parish’s first Iraq war fatality has been reported.

First Sergeant Michael Bordelon, a 1986 graduate of Patterson High School, Morgan City Louisiana, died today at 1:25 a.m. at Brook Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, of injuries sustained in a roadside bomb attack on an Iraqi convoy, according to friends of the family.

Bordelon, 37, originally was flown to Germany for treatment of injuries sustained in the Saturday, April 23, 2005, attack.

Media reports stated that a roadside bomb hit an Iraqi army convoy in Mosul, wounding three soldiers. One of them, according to Bruce Bordelon of Bayou Vista, the First Sergeant’s father, was his son, Mike.

Local sources who followed the soldier’s recovery efforts said Bordelon, who was serving his second tour of duty in Iraq, sustained third-degree burns and internal injuries in the attack.

“He stayed in his (Stryker combat) vehicle until all his men were safe,” said one friend, Sal “Sammy” Russo of Morgan City, who employs Bordelon’s sister.

Bordelon was serving in the 1st Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, Bravo Company, based at Fort Lewis, Washington.

Bordelon also is survived by his wife, Mila, and children, Mike Jr., Jacob and Johanna; his mother, Dolores, of Bayou Vista; a sister, Doreen Scioneaux of Morgan City; and three nieces and nephews.

Sources close to the family said Bordelon’s body will be flown from Texas to the Harry P. Williams Memorial Airport in Patterson in preparation of memorial services at Ibert’s Mortuary in Patterson.

The date and time of those services have yet to be set.

He will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Washington.

Gene Bosworth, a member of the St. Mary Detachment, Marine Corps League, said this morning that all local veterans organizations were on standby for any escort or other assistance necessary.

He said he was especially interested in initiating some sort of fund to assist Bordelon’s widow and children.

While this is the first confirmed death of a St. Mary Parish soldier in Iraq, the death toll for members of the U.S. military that have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003 is nearing 1,600, according to The Associated Press.

During his term at PHS, Bordelon was an all-district performer on the Lumberjack football squad.

One of his teachers, Evelyn Estay, said his friends used to call him “Rocky” because his physical features resembled those of Sylvester Stalone’s.

“He was a great person,” she said. “All of us here are saddened by the news.”

Fort Lewis soldier dies at Texas hospital
By Michael Gilbert;
Courtesy of The News Tribune
May 11th, 2005

A Fort Lewis soldier wounded in a suicide bombing last month in Mosul, Iraq, died of his injuries early Tuesday at a Texas Army hospital, family members say.

First Sergeant Michael Bordelon was badly burned in the April 23, 2005, attack that also claimed the life of Sergeant Anthony Davis, Jr. The two are from the 1st Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, which has now lost nine men in its nearly eight months in Iraq.

The battalion is part of the 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, a Stryker brigade from Fort Lewis, Washington.

Family members told his hometown papers in Louisiana that Bordelon, 37, died about 1:25 a.m. Tuesday at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, where he’d been treated for third-degree burns and internal injuries.

He was from St. Mary Parish, Louisiana.

Bordelon is survived by his wife, Mila, two sons and a daughter, who live in Spanaway.

Dan Martin, whose mother-in-law lives across the street from the Bordelons, said the soldier was always helping out, whether it was fixing a car or helping put together newly bought lawn furniture.

“He was the kind of guy that anybody would want as a neighbor,” Martin said. “He was just a really good guy.”

Fort Lewis officials said they didn’t have any information for release today because Bordelon’s death still hadn’t been officially announced by the Department of Defense.

Memorial ceremonies are pending at his unit in Mosul and at Fort Lewis. Family members told the Lafayette Advertiser and the Morgan City Daily Review they were planning a funeral in Louisiana and burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

BORDELON, MICHAEL JOSEPH

  • 1SG   US ARMY
  • DATE OF BIRTH: 11/02/1967
  • DATE OF DEATH: 05/10/2005
  • BURIED AT: SECTION 60  SITE 8112
    ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY

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