“He wears the car,” Cestaro said.
What they really want people to see is the website address that’s part of the artwork on the rear of the car — www.derekherrera.com.
Cestaro said that he served with Lt. Derek Herrera a few years ago when the 1st Battalion, 9th Marines went to Iraq.
In June 2012, Herrera — now a captain — was shot while leading a special-operations patrol in the Helmand Valley in Afghanistan. The bullet lodged between two vertebrae.
“He’s paralyzed,” but Herrera is still on active duty, Cestaro said, “and he wants to get back into it.”
It’s been quite a trip so far, and not just because of the distinctive ride. It’s a little crowded in there, the Alaskans acknowledge. Cestaro is a 5-foot-7, 200-pounder.
They have to figure out the driving rotations with height in mind. The 6-foot-4 Showalter doesn’t drive the ’35 Ford on a city street. Even when he’s hunched over behind the wheel, Showalter can’t see a stop light through the lowered wind shield.
Showalter did get a more normal driving experience a few days ago — depending on your definition of normal. On an isolated stretch of Canadian highway, Showalter and Cestaro saw a tractor-trailer hit a pickup truck. The driver got out, but Showalter and Cestaro had to help the passenger out through the sun roof; she was seriously injured.
The two combat veterans had casualty-care training, Cestaro said, and stayed with her until a first responder arrived. It was an oil-field medic, in an oil-company ambulance; he made arrangements to meet a hospital ambulance down the road and the medic spent the trip in back of his own emergency vehicle with the patient.
“I got to drive the ambulance,” Showalter said — complete with sirens and red light. “That was kind of fun.”
Tom Vogt: 360-735-4558; http://twitter.com/col_history; tom.vogt@columbian.com.
