Fredricksburg, VA, US
U.S. Navy
LCDR, Nuclear Weapons Safety Officer, Strategic Weapons Programming
8/9/2010, Washington, DC, US
My name is Shannon Allen and my husband LCDR Richard Thomas Allen passed away quite unexpectedly on 08/09/10. He was out on a daily jog and he as stricken with SCD (Sudden Cardiac Death) … He never before had any health problems EVER, so as you can imagine this was a huge shock for our whole family.
Let me tell you about our family… Rich and I were married on 01-04-2002. He had 2 boys at the time (Dean – 10 and Dayton – 6) and I had 1 daughter and 1 son at the time (Emily – 13 and Garrett – 9). We brought our families together and I adopted Dean and Dayton, and he was not able to adopt Emily and Garrett – due to their biological father having joint custody, however Rich was much more of a father to Emily and Garrett than their sperm donor ever was.
Emily who is now 22, is married to a Marine Corps Officer and they are currently stationed in 29 Palms, CA, Dean who is now 19 is in the Navy and is currently in Submarine School up in Groton, CT – studying to be a Sonar Technician, Garrett who is now 18, is in the Marine Corps and heading to his MOS school on January 10th, and our youngest son Dayton – is now 15 and is a sophomore in high school. I am currently a stay at home mom because I lost my job last February, so long story short, 3 kids left the nest, lost my job and husband in 2010 – a very stressful year to say the least, but I know God is in control.
Rich was in the Navy for 21 years. He was enlisted 10 years and then went into the LDO program and was an Officer for 11 years. He was a Submariner for most of his career. We moved to the DC area in 2007. He was active duty when he passed away, and he worked for Strategic Weapons Programming (which is under the Department of Defense) in Washington DC as the Nuclear Weapons Safety Officer.
Rich was born 05-15-1971 and he was 39 at the time of his passing. We all miss him SOOOOO very much.