Local G.I. dies in Afghanistan

In mid-January, as then Private First Class Jason von Zerneck huddled with his wife and two of his three children before deploying from the 69th Infantry Division Armory in Manhattan to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, then to Afghanistan, he told a reporter, “Leaving them behind is definitely the hardest thing.”
“My wife is going to be a single mother for a whole year.”
The war ended for von Zerneck on Thursday, October 2 - on a road near the town of Qara Bagh in Karze (Ghazni) Province, in eastern Afghanistan.
The 33-year-old Kew Gardens resident died when his vehicle overturned during “a logistical convoy,” according to the Department of Defense. There was no word of other injuries and the incident is still under investigation.
Von Zerneck joined the New York Army National Guard in February 2006, first as a member of the “Fighting 69th,” later with B troop 2nd Squadron of the 101st Cavalry.
“I knew what it was,” his mother Barbara said sobbing of the soldiers who came to her door.
“He came to love his brothers, his comrades, the Fighting 69th,” his father Richard, the elder von Zerneck, said during a televised interview. “He spoke with such glowing terms of them. The e-mails we got from him in Afghanistan, he sounded happy.”
The soldier’s words last January lent credence to his father’s faith.
“Some of the soldiers in this unit come from the poorest neighborhoods,” Jason von Zerneck told a reporter. “These are the people who are putting their lives on the line for the city and the country and sometimes that is forgotten,” he said.
Von Zerneck is the seventh New York Army National Guard soldier to die in Afghanistan since the 1,500 member 27th Brigade Combat Team deployed there in April - the third from Queens.
“All members of the New York National Guard will mourn the loss of this soldier who died defending his country and seeking to help the people of Afghanistan,” said Major General Joseph Taluto, the Adjutant General of New York and Commander of the New York National Guard.
Von Zerneck, a combat infantryman, received a posthumous promotion to Specialist, theBronze Star Medal and New York State Medal for Merit. He had numerous awards, including the Army Commendation Medal, NATO Medal and New York State Aid to Civil Authorities Medal.
He grew up in Manhattan, attended the Bronx High School of Science and City College, started an Internet business and worked for a bank in North Carolina before returning to New York.
“His intent was to go to New York and enlist in the National Guard,” his father reportedly said, adding that von Zerneck was “filling the need he had all his life to be a soldier.”
Von Zerneck’s wife, Stephanie, has requested privacy for the family funeral service.