Fond du Lac honors vets, Fort Hood shooting victims

FOND DU LAC - November 5th is a day Spc. Jason Zant will never forget.

“I actually looked at the date today and it was hard to believe three years had gone by since then,” said Zant, a native of Friendship.

Three years ago is when Zant witnessed the deadliest shooting ever at an American military base. 13 people were killed and more than two dozen others were injured when a lone gunman opened fire at Fort Hood in Texas. Zant wouldn't go into detail about what he saw that day.

On Monday, Zant joined about two hundred others in Fond du Lac, many of them veterans, to salute those military members who lost their lives at Fort Hood and elsewhere.

“It's a good way to particularly remember the sacrifices that were made and what it means,” said Zant.

“It's not good to forget that they served and they paid the ultimate sacrifice,” said Ron Roen, a retired U.S. Navy officer.

Roen, a Fond du Lac native, helped organize the ceremony. He said it was extra special to have Zant and his peers be a part of the event.

“Losing people is not easy, but in order to have an event where it was truly legitimate I asked for the unit personnel to be here to properly pay tribute to those that were lost from Wisconsin,” said Roen.

The tribute included a flyover from two F-16 Fighting Falcon jets.

“It brought chills back,” said Rob Vande Zande, a Fond du Lac alderman who helped organize the event. “I'm former Air Force, I was security, guarded F-16's, so seeing them fly over was a lot of excitement. It brought goose bumps.”

As for Zant, he says it is events like this that help him deal with what he saw three years ago.

“To see a community come together, it shows what America is about,” said Zant.

Zant's unit, the 467th Medical Detachment, is based out of Madison. It is the same one Fort Hood victims, Ssg. Amy Krueger, of Kiel, and Cpt. Russell Seager, of Mount Pleasant, served in.