Army Sgt. Cory L. Clark

Died August 28, 2007 Serving During Operation Enduring Freedom

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25, of Plant City, Fla.; assigned to the 585th Engineer Pipeline Company, 864th Engineer Battalion, 555th Engineer Brigade, Fort Lewis, Wash.; died Aug. 28 in Jaji, Afghanistan, of wounds sustained from an improvised explosive device. Also killed were Sgt. 1st Class Rocky H. Herrera and Sgt. Bryce D. Howard.

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Plant City soldier, deployed twice to Iraq, killed in Afghanistan

The Associated Press

PLANT CITY, Fla. — A Tampa-area soldier who was deployed twice to Iraq has been killed in Afghanistan.

Sgt. Cory L. Clark, 25, of Plant City, died Aug. 28 after an improvised bomb went off in Jaji, near Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, the Defense Department said.

Clark was assigned to the 585th Engineer Pipeline Company, 864th Engineer Battalion, 555th Engineer Brigade, based in Fort Lewis, Wash.

Two other soldiers from the same unit also died in the explosion.

Clark’s mother, Wrenita Codrington, said he called a few days ago to tell her about his promotion to sergeant. As an Army engineer, he had been working on cracked roads and broken buildings, she said.

After Clark’s first deployment to Iraq, he returned home to marry his high school sweetheart. The couple had three children before Clark was redeployed to Iraq, and later to Afghanistan.

Clark enlisted in the Army just after graduating from Durant High School in 2001. He was tired of working in a grocery store freezer, Codrington said.

“He joined the military, saying, ‘I’d rather get a little dirty than a lot cold all the time,’ ” Codrington told WTVT-TV.