2006/01/04
I've finally found the 12 hours needed to do some much needed work on this layer.

• Frank_McVey has spent many long hours manually updating the U.K. records: adding pictures and properly placing markers where GE gecoding and my patience fell short. He's had it done for nearly a month but I've been too busy to finally put it all together. Thanks so much Frank, sorry for the delay.
  
  
• ADDED: 324 casualities from Afghanistan. Some folks were wondering why they couldn't find loved ones on the map. My original data source included only Iraq. Decided to add Afghanistan (they are seperated into different folders on the layer)
  
  
• Added another month of Iraq data (leaving a lag as some reports/details drift in late). Iraq is now to Nov. 30th. Afghan up to Dec 28th.
  
  
• Confusion over placement of markers I don't have street addressed for any of these points, so locations are resolved to hometown only (per GE's search/geocoding). Originally I displaced multiple records for a single city northward (adding to the above confusion). They are now stacked vertically, ala the Iraqi mil/civil casualities layer. Don't forget to tilt/zoom over big cities to see all the points.
  
  
• There is a bit more information in the "Readme" placemark off the Eastern Seaboard check it out if you like.
  
  
• Need volunteers: if you have nothing but free time, and would like to contribute to this project, please contact me at the email below. I have a list of soldiers that do not have pictures, and others with unresolved home towns. It's too time consuming for me to do all the error correction myself. So if you would like to pitch in, I'd really appreciate it.
  

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A bit somber for my first post... but worth it. Appropriately, it's All Saint's Day.

Here's a map of the 2212 American and Coalition causalities since the war on Iraq began in March of 2003, up to Oct. 27th, 2005.
*Make sure to click on placemarks for personal information and photos*


I have absolutely no political motivations behind this work, so please don't read into any Pro or Anti-War/Bush/Iraqi messages that just aren't there. I just feel for the people that have died on both sides of this conflict (innocent, civilian, military or otherwise), and would like to help other grasp the magnitude of this loss. As you can see, there isn't a place in America that isn't affected. Don't forget to check out Europe, the Pacific Islands and a few other random places.

I am also interested in adding another layer representing the documented and/or estimated Iraqi military and civilian causualties. Although putting tens of thousands more points on the globe might be stretching Google Earth's (or your computer's) abilties. So we'll see.


Data was taken from icasualties.org
I asked permission to use their data, but have not yet heard back from them. If they are willing, I will use my scripts to pull data live from their database, as to keep this up to date. Google Earth's geocoding wasn't able to find some smaller US/foriegn towns (misspellings?). In these cases it's noted, and the placemark is set near the capital of the state or country.

Images are loaded directly from CNN's US & Coalition Causalities page. Irregularities in their jpg naming convention resulted in a hundred or so pictures available on CNN's site that aren't in this layer. Will try to fix if I have time.

Links to the appropriate icasualties.org (DoD, Centcom, News items), CNN pages are provided. Honor the Fallen's site has some nice stories about people... but no way to directly link to their pages. Searching for just the last name gives the best results.


I have done my best to correct errors. I will probably release another version (hopefully a URL with kml generated on-the-fly) in the future. I apologize if some of the foriegn names and home towns got screwed up, as there were some unicode/ANSI character problems. Will try to fix. If there are any errors for your friends or loved ones, please let me know, and I'll do my best to fix it.

Thanks for looking in...

Sean A. - purblindHorus )at( gmail )dot( com

Very Sobbering.

Your effort is commendable, a GE memorial.

RomulusJ
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"Theirs is not to reason why, Theirs is but to do and die."

This is an amazing first post. You seem sincere in what you are trying to accomplish and hope what you have done is taken well by the community. Some of these names I know directly from the brigade I served in. May God bless them and their families; may they rest in peace. I hope this country never forgets the debt they owe to the men and women who serve this country.

Thank you for this. Thank you for going to the trouble and taking the time.

Quote:

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I am also interested in adding another layer representing the documented and/or estimated Iraqi military and civilian causualties.

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I think this would be extremely valuable and everyone would owe you another great debt if you could do it.

I am guessing you know already, but IBC (Iraq Body Count) would be an excellent resource for such data. They are very conservative compared to other sources and verify all reports; so their figures tend to look lower than others', but they are respected as an independent authority largely because of this.

Peace.

Thanks for the tip... IBC's database page should be easy enough to harvest data from... so I will start working on it. Testing the limits of google earth with ~30k placemarks will be interesting...

If anyone else has recommendations as to sources for Iraqi causualties, please let me know.

I know this is a touchy subject, and to many people, seeing a death count for either side illicits strong emotional and intellectual responses. I realize that all sources will have some bias, political or otherwise, and frequently war causualties website are attacking one side or the other.

I want to keep this as apolitical as possible, as for me this project is more about the deaths sons and daughters, friends, parents, lovers and siblings... rather than enemies or allies. Someone out there has cried and mourned over every one of these people lost.

Sorry if the Zen attitude is getting old, I just want that to be clear.

A truly outstanding post.

Thanks, Sean.

Cheers

Frank

Excellent post. Thank you.

Thank you.

To say that your work is "unbelievable" doesn't do it justice. It's all too believable. A memorial and a living testimony. Thank you.

Col Wood was from Panama City, Florida.

He graduated Bay High School in 1979.

CLICK HERE for very good tribute from the local ABC Station with a very powerful interview with his parents.

Col Wood is the highest ranking military member to lose his life during Operation Iraqi Freedom.