Speaker Joseph Ortu recalls 1983 Beirut bombing victim
Joseph Ortu, keynote speaker at Monday’s Veterans Day ceremony, asked the audience to remember a fallen Hillsborough soldier, Marine Cpl. James J. Langon, who was killed in a terrorist attack on an American base in Beirut, Lebanon, in October 1983.
Mr. Ortu, retired from the Air Force as a command chief master sergeant, spoke at the fifth annual ceremony held in the biting evening breeze at the Garden of Honor in the municipal complex.
He said Tuesday he and other members of Hillsborough VFW Post 8371 — especially Dan Wistuk — had been talking about Cpl. Langon, who graduated from the local high school in 1981. Mr. Ortu researched him old newspapers on microfilm at the library, and had names and phone numbers of his parents, but hadn’t had a chance to call them.
Mr. Ortu said he could have talked about any number of local service members.
”He just kind of touched us at the post,” he said, adding that perhaps they might ask for some sort of recognition, like naming a street after him.
He was a cook and was preparing breakfast” when terrorists crashed explosive-laden trucks through gates at the post and into buildings. “I don’t think anybody knew what hit them.”
Mr. Ortu, a township resident who annually attends the township’s Memorial Day weekend ceremonies, said he had been asked to speak at the event. He was in active service from 1968-72, including two years in Thailand as a munitions specialist, he said, and had been in service in Kosovo. He was stationed in Turkey, working to enforce the no-fly zone, when terrorists hit the World Trade Center towers.
Mr. Ortu, who now works for TD Bank, said his service felll 10 days shy of 36 years. He retired from the guard about six years ago.