LAS VEGAS, NV, USA U.S. Army SSG, 257TH TRANSPORTATION COMPANY, LAS VEGAS, NEVADA 89104 KUWAIT CITY, KUWAIT 09/01/2003
Army Staff Sergeant Cameron B. Sarno was full of energy. After driving a truck all day, he would drop by to see his aunt and the two would talk late into the night. And his enthusiasm for the Army Reserve was boundless. “He was gung-ho,” said his aunt, Nancy Gurdison. “He really believed he should do something for his country.” “He always had a smile on his face,” said Spc. Anthony Grimando. “There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for anybody. He was selfless.”
Staff Sergeant Sarno, 43 was from Waipahu, Hawaii and was known to friends and family as “Boodee”. Only 5-foot-4, he enjoyed martial arts, hunting and surfing. He surfed the big waves on the North Shore of Oahu without fear. He joined the military soon after graduating from high school, following in the footsteps of his late father,
His son, Cameron Bryan “B.J.” Takeuchi, following the tradition of his father and grandfather, served in Afghanistan.
In 1998, moved to Las Vegas in 1998 looking for a better job and a lower cost of living. He was assigned to the 257th Transportation Company, Army Reserve, Las Vegas, Nevada. The 257th “Rollin’ Thunder” had been called up in February, deploying in April 2003. They were due to return at the end of September. Upon his return, Sarno hoped to open a martial arts academy.
He was killed September 1, 2003 while changing a flat tire on a heavy transport truck in Kuwait City, Kuwait when another military transport ran into his truck. He had 19 years of combined active and reserve duty in the Army.
He lives on in the hearts and minds of his fiancée Suzanne Walker of Henderson, Nevada, his son “BJ”, his brother James Sarno Jr., his cousin Brian Sarno, his mother, and countless other family and friends. His ashes were scattered at Oahu’s Makaha Beach by his surf buddies and beach friends to recognize his love for the sea.
(Sources: Associated Press “Honor the Fallen”; http://www.nevadapatriotfund.org/ourheroes.htm; “STAFF SGT. CAMERON SARNO: Reality of war hits home” Keith Rogers, “Las Vegas Review Journal, 8 September 2003; “Iraq war vets eulogize comrade from Oahu,” Adam Goldman, Associated Press 3 September 2003)