Our situation, the enemy situation in Samara at the time, the primary threat was RKG3 grenades,

which shoots a slug through up to, I think, at the time was six inches of armor or something

like that, and then bounces around inside

and just destroys whatever it comes in contact with.

We used to say it travels at the speed of light

with the heat of the sun.

I rolled to my right,

and I was frantically grabbing for this thing.

Somehow, some way, I put my right hand on it and threw it and quickly yelled grenade.

But before I could get the nade part out of grenade, I said gruh and it exploded in midair.

Hi and welcome to The Spear, a podcast by the Modern War Institute at West Point. I'm John Amble, editorial director at MWI, and The Spear is our platform to explore the combat experience. Each episode includes

a single one-on-one interview with a guest who walks us through a particular event and

their role in it. A battle, a firefight, a mission. It's a first-person account of combat. In this

episode, MWI's Captain Jake Moraldi talks to Major Nick Eslinger.

In October 2008, Major Eslinger was a platoon leader on his first deployment in Iraq.

One day, while on patrol in the city of Samara, he looked up just in time to see a grenade thrown almost directly at him.

What he did next is pretty incredible, as is the whole story you're about to hear.

Before we hear that story, a couple quick things.

First, if you like this and other episodes of the spear, please take just a second, head

over to iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts and give us a rating or leave a review.

And second, as always, what you're about to hear are the views of the participants and don't represent the position of West Point, the Army, or the U.S. government.

All right, here's Captain Jake Morali and Major Nick Eslinger.

...