Double-amputee Kevin Pannell snowboards toward a ski instructor through a half pipe Jan. 29 in Vail, Colo. Pannell, from Portland, Ore., lost both legs in a grenade attack when his Army patrol was ambushed by Iraqi insurgents in 2004. He was part of a group of a dozen war wounded and their families participating in the Vail Veterans Program winter ski retreat. The program is designed to help severely wounded U.S. service members rehabilitate and rebuild confidence through learning to ski and snowboard. Some of the wounded are flown in directly from Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. The visits to the Rocky Mountain retreat have been incorporated into Walter Reed’s rehabilitation program for troops who have suffered from traumatic injuries, including amputations, brain damage and other severe wounds, most of which were sustained in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. (Photos by John Moore/Getty Images)
Wounded veteran Kevin Pannell shows a prosthesis to a child after changing it out for a more athletic leg in order to snowboard.
