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Back on Course

In 2008, nine-year-old Thomas Bonus was nearly paralyzed during a diving accident. Today, he’s a healthy, active 12-year-old who loves golf—and who recently caddied for golf legend Fuzzy Zoeller at The Principal Charity Classic.

By Linda Pixley

That day – July 1, 2008 – started out like any other summer day for the busy Bonus family of West Des Moines. As usual, Cyndi Bonus drove her kids, 13-year-old Robbie, nine-year-old Thomas and four-year-old Katie, to Des Moines Golf and Country Club for their daily swim team practice.

At the pool, Thomas mounted the starting block to practice the relay. When his relay teammate touched the edge of the pool beneath him, Thomas, dove in—just as he’d done dozens of times before. But this time, something went wrong, and Thomas hit his head on the bottom of the pool.

Cyndi looked over to see Thomas floating face down in the water. The sight was every parent’s nightmare. At that moment, Thomas says he was conscious but couldn’t move his limbs. “It felt like it was a dream,” he explains.

The coaches acted quickly, bringing Thomas to the surface and stabilizing him with a backboard until an emergency medical services (EMS) team arrived. “Thomas was breathing fine, but he couldn’t move his limbs for several minutes,” said Cyndi. “It was very frightening.”

Thomas was taken by ambulance to Blank Children’s Hospital, where physicians and nurses were ready and waiting for him to arrive. “Our team begins mobilizing immediately when we receive a call from EMS about a pediatric trauma patient,” said James Swegle, MD, trauma medical director for Iowa Methodist and Blank Children’s Hospital.

Thomas was admitted to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at Blank. He was put in a neck brace, and while he began to move his legs later that day, he had terrible pain—followed by numbness—in his arms. In fact, the pain was so severe that he laid in the hospital bed with his arms supported on pillows and “would get very mad if someone slightly jarred the bed,” said his dad, Ken Bonus.

After several tests, including computed tomography (CT) scans and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, physicians determined that Thomas had fractured the fifth and sixth vertebrae in his neck. At that point, doctors weren’t sure how much—if any—movement Thomas would regain in his arms.

For that reason and many others, those first days were particularly tough for Thomas and his family. “Thomas couldn’t have any food, water, ice chips or anything else by mouth because of the risk of him choking or ingesting something into his lungs and complicating things,” said Ken. And Thomas continued to experience intense pain in his arms.

Fortunately, the hospital’s Child Life staff, who help kids (and their families) deal with hospitalizations, were there to help the Bonuses during those rough days. For instance, when the cards and letters from friends and family started pouring in, Thomas couldn’t see them unless they were held right in front of his face (he couldn’t move his neck or his arms). So the Child Life team hung his cards from the ceiling over his bed so he could see them.

After five days, Thomas was fitted with a halo vest—a piece of equipment that keeps the head and neck immobile. “We were all very scared and nervous when the halo was attached,” Cyndi says. The procedure to attach the halo vest went well, though, and Thomas’ intensive rehabilitation—which lasted for nearly two years—began.

Specially trained pediatric physical and occupational therapists worked with Thomas to help him regain strength and balance, particularly since the halo vest added considerable weight to his upper body. “We learned that we use our heads for balance to walk upright,” says Ken. “Thomas was unable to move his head due to the halo, so he had to learn to adjust his upper body from the waist to balance.”

Therapists continued to work with Thomas on relearning how to perform simple actions of daily life, such as eating or scratching his nose, until he was discharged on August 6, 2008. He was still wearing the halo when he returned to school at Jordan Creek Elementary in West Des Moines later that month. “I was excited, but I was also scared of what people would think,” Thomas says.

The Child Life team stepped in again, sending a specialist to meet with teachers and students at his school. “They explained to the kids that Thomas would look different. They talked about the halo vest and even brought a weight filled with sand to show everyone how heavy the vest was,” says Cyndi. That helped the kids understand what Thomas was going through. As a result, his transition back to school went smoothly.

Thomas wore his halo for nine weeks and a neck brace for an additional two months, and he continued to perform rehabilitation exercises at Blank and at home for nearly two years. And while contact sports—such as football—are off-limits to Thomas for now, he can play soccer, swim and golf.

In fact, it was his lo

I covered this unit during the Gulf War and was at MHAFB when they returned. As Paul Harvey often says...heres the rest of the story:

Operation Desert Storm - First Wave to Iraq
by Ike Sweesy, EF-111 Flight Lead, 390 Electronic Combat Squadron, USAF, Ta-if, Saudi Arabia

The EF-111 is a Supersonic Radar Jammer plane modified by Grumman from the General Dynamics F-111 Fighter Bomber. It was designed to jam the enemy early warning and missile threat radars. EF's from both Mountain Home AFB, ID and Upper Heyford, UK flew in Desert Storm. The receivers are located on the tail of the aircraft in "the football", and the transmitters on the belly in "the canoe". The EF has since been retired from service.


The following letter to family and friends was written a few days after the first mission to Baghdad.

I had my first mission early, early 17 January morning and it was spectacular. I know everyone was watching things on the news. I was in the first wave leading three EF-111s for the strike against Baghdad and there were over 70 aircraft in the mission. Our package was striking airfields, missile sites and military targets in and around Baghdad itself. It was AWESOME!!!

For the two days prior to the attack, we were working on the mission planning and getting our body clocks adjusted for the 1:30 AM launch. The night prior to the mission I stayed up until about 5 AM putting the final touches on my mission then went to bed. I could only sleep until 11 AM then I got up and puttered around at Intell and the Squadron. I cleaned my Chemical Warfare mask and put in new filters then went and found the security policeman that I had bartered with. I traded one of my flight suits for a bayonet and sheath. It is VERY sharp! I took off my rings and patches and set up my combat wallet (plastic ziplok) taking only my ID card, some money and my New Testament, no pictures allowed. I put together my web belt and canteen with my gun holster and hooked on the bayonet. The extra water and my survival equipment would be easier to carry if I got shot down. We normally have our .38 pistol on our survival vest but it is in a bad place right above the left kidney and it gets in the way. I have an extra helmet bag to hold my web belt, two flashlights, a set of desert fatigues and floppy sun hat (no desert flight suits yet), my Chem gear and mask, and my big ziplok bag with sunscreen, skin lotion, aspirin, gum, pepto bismal tablets, malaria tablets, go pills, blistex, ear plugs, eye drops, throat lozenges razor blade knife, camouflage paint, fire starter, matches, nylon cord (two thicknesses), and camouflage scarf. I also carry my little Swiss Army knife that Sandy gave me two Christmases ago plus my big Swiss Army knife that Bob gave me. All my knives I have sharpened to a razor edge. The bag fits below my legs and between the seat and joystick. My helmet bag with the Escape and Evasion maps and my flight jacket goes under the seat. What about ejection you ask me - in the F-111 the entire cockpit goes with you and you land on a balloon!! I'm not kidding!

About 1930 our flight piled into the PimpMobile and went to the Mess Tent for dinner. It's called the PimpMobile because it has felt curtains with little danglies hanging down and felt covers on the dashboard and other plastic parts. Inside the Mess Tent door, there is a sign-in sheet and everyone always makes a joke of it. Sometimes we will all sign one person's name or else "Mickey Mouse" or even "Dan Quayle". We had a variety of "sign ins" tonight also but I was feeling particularly pugilistic so I just signed "Fighter Pilot". My good Christian friend "BRENT" behind me signed just his first name in a mock shaking script. We all laughed at each other but we all understood what danger we were flying into. After dinner we all went back to the MPC (Mission Planning Cell) for our final Intell update and got our Blood Chits issued.

The Blood Chit is a paper with the US Flag on one side and a message in several languages that promises that the US government will pay a person several thousand dollars if they will aid a downed airman to escape back to Allied territory. I had not seen one since Southeast Asia and we all hoped that we would keep them in our pockets and turn then in the next morning after the mission.

At 2115 we attended the mass briefing with the weather, Escape and Evasion briefing, taxi plan, and the enemy situation. This lasted about 45 minutes. At the end, the Wing Commander stood up and all he said was "Alright guys, let's go to war." There was no cheering, no bravado. There were probably some of us that would not come back.

After this briefing I took my flight to the squadron and we briefed for the mission. I had heard some talk in the squadron about turning around if enemy Mig fighters were spotted so I spent some time talking about the difference between aggressiv