Erie Paratrooper, Now 92, A 'true American Hero'

(AP) — In the early morning hours of D-Day, June 6, 1944, Erie resident Joseph Morettini, a 19-year-old paratrooper with the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne Division, jumped from a Douglas C-47 Skytrain over France's Normandy coast. German anti-aircraft tracer fire filled the nighttime sky, and Morettini's first thoughts were that his life was about to end before he reached the ground. When I landed, I landed between two trees, about 6 inches off the ground, and I was swinging back and forth like a swing, and then I jumped up and I sat on the ground.? Morettini survived D-Day, but suffered a gunshot wound to his right arm on July 4, 1944, when his company fought and took what he recalls as Hill 195 during the Normandy campaign. Malone, a former UPMC Hamot chief executive, and Dunbar met and became friends with Morettini after Riley Dunbar and Morettini met for lunch in 2015 in Millcreek Township to share stories about training and jumping. [...] Bill and I have spent time with Mr.

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