By Sumayya
Five soldiers finished a very long walk on Sunday. They did it to raise money for the people who died and those who are still fighting for their lives in the hospital after a terrible fire at the CFB Wainwright military base in Alberta.
The group walked more than 150 kilometres. They started at CFB Petawawa, the base where they work, and walked all the way to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in downtown Ottawa.
Private Nathan Thomas said they walked for 35 hours. They kept moving through pain and freezing cold night weather. He explained that they knew they had to do something to help the victims, even though the accident happened far away across the country. “We really thought about the boys that had to go through this and kept pushing for them,” he said.
“They’ve gone through worse than we’ve gone through on that walk,” agreed Private Logan Toupin, who walked with him.
On October 17, four soldiers died and dozens more were hurt at CFB Wainwright. A fire started during a training exercise and spread very quickly. One of the soldiers who died was 23-year-old Private Aidan Goulding.
Thomas said some of the walkers trained with Goulding at Wainwright, and they also know two other soldiers who are currently in the hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU). Thomas noted that they last saw Goulding at their graduation ceremony at the end of July.
“I honestly never saw him, even through all the hardship we went through. He always kept the guys motivated and kept us pushing forward,” Thomas said.
“It was really devastating.” Toupin described Goulding as a “super funny guy.”
“Always a smile on his face whenever we’re in tough time on course,” Toupin said. “Always brought the morale up.”
The group used Goulding’s motivating spirit to help them take every single step of their long journey.
Group hopes to raise $10,000
Private Dominic Ferguson said the group made the plan to walk on Wednesday. By midnight on Saturday, they were already taking their first steps.
The group explained that they did not do any extra training or wait around because they wanted to raise $10,000 as fast as possible. They want to use the money to support Goulding’s family and the soldiers who are still recovering in the hospital.
“We all knew why we wanted to do this,” said Thomas. “You’re hurting bad, but you look to the guys to your left and right and… there’s no thought of giving up. You just know you’re all going to complete it.”
Ferguson, who is originally from Ottawa, said that visiting the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier means even more to him now.
“It means a lot more to all of us being in the military and having friends that have been injured or other things,” Ferguson said. “It means a lot to be here.”
