In 2006, an
improvised explosive device explosion Afghanistan left Master Sgt. Israel Del
Toro, Air Force Academy 10th Force Support Squadron world class athlete, with
3rd-degree burns over 80 percent of his body.
Though doctors gave
him a 15 percent chance to live, the last thing he was afraid of.chance to
live, death was the last thing he was afraid of.
“I had this fear that my son was going to run
away from me when he saw me,” said Del Toro, who fought through a four-month
coma. “Seeing myself in the mirror for the first time after the explosion, that
was my darkest hour. If a 30-something-year-old man sees him self and thinks
he’s a monster, what is a three-year-old kid going to think?”
The wounded warrior
was invited as the guest speaker for chapter two of the Enlisted Character
Development series, which focused on resiliency.
During the lecture,
held April 13 at the Pfingston Center, Del Toro, a Bronze Star and Purple Heart
recipient, told Airmen in attendance he found the resiliency to push through an
“excruciatingly painful” rehabilitation by focusing on his son and family. The
process wasn’t easy as Del Toro admits initially feeling so ashamed of his
appearance that he wished doctors had let him die after the bombing. The
decision to keep fighting through the pain of recovery paid off.
“I remember seeing my son stop when he saw me-
I had so many bandages on that I looked like a mummy,” said Del Toro,
recalling, when he finally got to see his family again months after the injury.
“He tilted his head and said, ‘Papi?’ and I go, ‘It’s me, son,’ and he runs
over and hugs me. It was the best hug of my life.”
That embrace
represented more than acceptance to Del Toro; it was vindication after a life
that presented him with plenty of chances to fall.
Born into a tough
neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Del Toro lost his dad and his mother
within the same year at age 12. After only two years of college, he had to
return home to care for a grandfather who suffered a stroke and a grandmother
with cancer. After joining the Air Force as a tactical air control party
commander and struggling with the separation from his family while deployed,
the IED explosion occurred.
Instead of mourning,
Del Toro said he’s always looked at these misfortunes as a series of tests that
helped prepare him to fight through obstacles like the one he found in
Afghanistan.
“The whole time
during rehab, I wanted to show my son, ‘yeah, dad got jacked up, but he’s not
going to quit. He’s going to keep fighting,’” Del Toro said.
Like many Airmen,
family has been the source of Del Toro’s resiliency. The term “family,”
however, isn’t limited to Del Toro’s blood relatives.
“My teammates came
from all over the world to help us out during my recovery,” said Del Toro. “My
wife, Carmen, wasn’t a U.S. Citizen, so they went across the border to Mexico
just to help get her into the U.S. so she could come see me in the hospital.”
While Del Toro’s Air
Force story could have ended after his discharge from the hospital, the same
instinct that helped him keep fighting through rehab kicked his career back on
track, too.
In 2010, just four
years after his injury, Del Toro made
headlines as the first 100 percent disabled Airman to re-enlist. Since then,
he’s become a advocate for improving the Air Force’s care and rehabilitation of
burn victims. He’s now a world-class Paraathlete who’s training at the Air
Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in hopes of becoming a decathlete in the 2016 Summer Paralympics
at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
That’s not bad for
someone who spent 30 seconds as the equivalent of the “Human Torch” from the
Fantastic Four, Del Toro said.
“That’s how my son
first described what I’d been through,” he shrugged. “But now we have a
different saying: ‘through these flames, I am stronger.’”
Master Sgt. Jorge
Cotijo, Enlisted Character Development Center manager, said Del Toro’s
resiliency makes him a strong example for Airmen who might go through trying
times in the Air Force.
“Del Toro, when he
was trying to reenlist, he wondered whether his face was the best thing for new
Airmen to see,” Cortijo said. But he embodies resilience – and that’s something
Airmen need to lean on when life throws you a curveball.”
The Enlisted
Character Development Series takes place quarterly; chapter three is slated for
June. Call 671-6799 for more information.