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Contact Info
Home Town Muscle Shoals
Last Address 117 Wilbanks Street Harvest, Alabama
Date of Passing Apr 27, 2011
Location of Interment Old Bethel Cemetery - Leighton, Alabama
Official Badges
Unofficial Badges
Additional Information
Last Known Activity:
Muscle Shoals
Ronnie Lee McGaha Jr., 42, died Wednesday, April 27, 2011. Public viewing will be from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday at Trinity Memorial Funeral Home, Muscle Shoals. The funeral service will be at 2 p.m. Friday at Bethel Colbert Missionary Baptist Church, Leighton, with burial in the church cemetery. The body will be placed in the church one hour before the service.
HARVEST, Alabama -- American and U.S. Navy flags flutter on a pole beside the rubble that was once the home Ronnie McGaha shared with his family on Wilbanks Lane in Harvest.
McGaha, a 20-year Navy veteran, and his wife, Lisa, had recently remodeled their two-story Colonial-style house to add a shop where Lisa could work as a hairdresser, said Maurice McGaha, Ronnie's brother. Ronnie and Lisa, their 24-year-old son, Aaron, and teenage daughter, Denae, were at the house when the storm barreled down on them.
Ronnie, 42, had called his family downstairs as the storm approached the area, and they huddled together under the staircase. Denae had decided to go upstairs to get her shoes, but her dad said, "'I think we had better wait,'" Maurice said.
When Ronnie heard the tornado coming, he scrambled out from under the stairs to grab Denae as "the house exploded," Maurice said. "He pushed everybody down."
The bottom floor of the house collapsed and the fireplace fell on McGaha, who died from internal injuries. Denae was bruised but not otherwise hurt. Lisa was uninjured, but Aaron has a broken foot and pelvis.
"He died saving his family," Maurice said.
This is from the Ron's Facebook Notes:
By Ronnie McGaha on Tuesday, January 4, 2011 at 12:57p.m. Question of the day: Do you really want to go to heaven or do you just want to stay out of hell? There IS a difference. Do you look forward to praising the Lord forever and ever, or is any place other than the hot pit okay with you? Would Jesus consider YOU a friend or an associate? Does your talk, walk, prayer life, faith, and monetary contributions meet the standards God sets or do you do just enough to "LOOK" better than someone else? Just enough.. is not good enough!!
In the end, trophies will not be given for "First Place Christian." There will not be a hope of skimming by because the Lord is not judging on a curve. Your (our) salvation is not relative to how anyone other than you lived and whom you (I) chose as your (my) Lord and Savior. Some choose their spouses, their parents, their job, their bank account, their stock portfolio, and/or their friends as their Savior. All of these things will pass away. "On a solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand." Remember that?
Battles have been fought, blood has been shed, and much time and energy has been expended to fight for equal rights for different groups throughout history. Jesus says salvation is free and it doesn't matter who you are, where you're from, what you've done, what color your skin is, or how much money you have. Jesus says...:...He stands at the door and knocks.." Imagine that. Such a wonderful gift and He doesn't even ask you to do anything more to get it than open the door. Yet, some of us are too stubborn, too scared, or just plain too lazy to do that.
I'm going to stop now. I've said more than I intended. Tomorrow is not promised. There have many that have worked and saved almost their whole lives to prepare themselves for a wonderful retirement and never make it there. Yet, they haven't done one thing to prepare for what comes after this. You can decide today to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior. Some will call you crazy. Some will throw your past in your face. YOU might even throw your past in your own face. Guess what? Jesus knows ALL about you and what you have done..... AND He still wants you anyway. Okay, that's it.
Ronnie M.
Other Comments:
Gulf War/Defense of Saudi Arabia /Operation Desert Shield
From Month/Year
August / 1990
To Month/Year
January / 1991
Description
In 1990, fellow Arab Gulf states refused to endorse Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's plan to cut production and raise the price of oil, leaving him frustrated and paranoid. Iraq had incurred a mountain of debt during its war with Iran that had lasted for most of the previous decade, and the Iraqi President felt that his Arab brothers were conspiring against him by refusing to raise oil prices. Therefore, after weeks of massing troops along the Iraq-Kuwait border and accusing Kuwait of various crimes, Hussein sent seven divisions of the Iraqi Army into Kuwait in the early morning hours of 2 August 1990. The invasion force of 120,000 troops and 2,000 tanks quickly overwhelmed Iraq's neighbor to the south, allowing Hussein to declare, in less than a week, that Kuwait was his nation's nineteenth province. The United Nations responded quickly, passing a series of resolutions that condemned the invasion, called for an immediate withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait, imposed a financial and trade embargo on Iraq, and declared the annexation void.
Regarding Iraq's actions as a threat to a vital interest of the US, namely the oil production capability of the Persian Gulf region, President George Bush ordered warplanes and ground forces to Saudi Arabia after obtaining King Fahd's approval. Iraqi troops had begun to mass along the Saudi border, breaching it at some points, and indicating the possibility that Hussein's forces would continue south into Saudi Arabia's oil fields. Operation DESERT SHIELD, the US military deployment to first defend Saudi Arabia grew rapidly to become the largest American deployment since the Southeast Asia Conflict. The Gulf region was within US Central Command's (CENTCOM) area of responsibility. Eventually, 30 nations joined the military coalition arrayed against Iraq, with a further 18 countries supplying economic, humanitarian, or other type of assistance.
Carriers in the Gulf of Oman and the Red Sea responded, US Air Force interceptors deployed from bases in the United States, and airlift transports carried US Army airborne troopers to Saudi Arabia. Navy prepositioning ships rushed equipment and supplies for an entire marine brigade from Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to the gulf. During the next six months the United States and its allies built up a powerful force in the Arabian peninsula. The navy also began maritime intercept operations in support of a US-led blockade and United Nations sanctions against Iraq.
Coalition forces, specifically XVIII Airborne Corps and VII Corps, used deception cells to create the impression that they were going to attack near the Kuwaiti boot heel, as opposed to the "left hook" strategy actually implemented. XVIII Airborne Corps set up "Forward Operating Base Weasel" near the boot heel, consisting of a phony network of camps manned by several dozen soldiers. Using portable radio equipment, cued by computers, phony radio messages were passed between fictitious headquarters. In addition, smoke generators and loudspeakers playing tape-recorded tank and truck noises were used, as were inflatable Humvees and helicopters.
On 17 January 1991, when it became clear that Saddam would not withdraw, Desert Shield became Desert Storm.
