SSG ALEX JAUREGUI

Woodland, CA

Mission Accomplished on March 14, 2015

Alex Jauregui joined the Army when he was eighteen, earning his airborne wings as a paratrooper with the intent of making the military a lifelong career.

On April 8, 2012, during his fourth combat deployment, Staff Sergeant Jauregui was at his platoon outpost in Sangsar, Afghanistan with the 2-508th Parachute Infantry Regiment when a squad detected an improvised explosive device (IED). After escorting Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) to the site, SSG Jauregui spotted a secondary wire leading to another IED. After photographing the site and approaching his platoon sergeant and EOD technician to share this new information, he stepped on a third IED. Alex lost both legs, and sustained significant hearing loss, and extensive injuries to his right hand and forearm.  With no medic and no morphine to ease the pain of his burning legs, SSG Jauregui found comfort in the familiar voices of brothers coming to his immediate aid, urging him to stay conscious until MEDEVAC arrived.

Airlifted to Kandahar, and then transported to Landstuhl, Germany, Alex returned stateside to Walter Reed Medical Center where he received extensive rehabilitative therapy.

A recipient of an HFOT specially adapted custom home in 2015, Alex and his wife, Isa, whom he met while on active duty in Iraq, are parents to two sons, Bron and Danny, and a daughter, Lilly. The financial freedom of a mortgage-free home has allowed Alex to start a family beekeeping business, Fury Bees, on his property. Alex has grown his business from 75 hives to over 1300 and credits his HFOT home with helping him rest and recover after a long day of farming.

In addition to volunteering at Ranger Road, a nonprofit where he manages the skydiving operations, Alex is often a Veteran Representative at Homes For Our Troops build events, paying it forward to his fellow Veterans as a strong supporter of HFOT’s mission. Isa works as a grants manager at the Center for Land-Based Learning, a nonprofit aimed at cultivating future generations of farmers. In their free time, Alex and Isa attend their children’s sporting events, and enjoy spending time building their adapted vacation home.

Alex would like HFOT donors and supporters to know their generosity is life-changing for Veterans. “The amount of support we receive is just phenomenal,” he says.