'Freedom Calls' connect soldiers, families online

Limited funds

Harlow, who has not been to Iraq but has received a handshake from President Bush and military commendations for his work, said the charity’s annual budget doesn’t allow it to help everyone who requests a warfront connection back home.

There are other video-conferencing options available, but they are usually less flexible.

The military offers video hookups from the front back to home bases, but there are time restrictions and it’s difficult for soldiers if their families live elsewhere. The service also can’t handle events that take place off base, such as weddings, births and graduations, Harlow said.

United Service Organizations spokesman John Hanson said the USO doesn’t offer video conferencing like Freedom Calls.

Instead, it distributes 300- to 500-minute phone cards to soldiers and plans to open a center in Iraq that will allow soldiers to e-mail messages home for free.

The Red Cross, in an emergency, has a service that keeps military personnel in touch with home following the death or serious illness of a family member or other key events, such as the birth of a child.

Harlow said Freedom Calls also offers services at Okinawa in Japan and to wounded military at Landstuhl hospital in Germany so they can conference with their families in the states.

“And, we hope to be offering services from Walter Reed (Army hospital in D.C.) in the near future,” he said, adding it’s been a slow process. “We’re dealing with the bureaucracy.”

Before each video conference, volunteers with Freedom Calls work to get families together for the virtual meeting while commanders and the Red Cross in Iraq locate the soldiers involved.

'It's more than you can really explain'
On March 30, Army Col. Jim Close was in Iraq and allowed to see his 2-day-old son, Ryan, in an hour-long link to a Peterborough, N.H. hospital. Close hadn’t seen his family in eight months; his 10-year-old daughter, Megan, played an Elton John tune on her saxophone for her dad, and his 4-year-old son, Connor, showed off his toy light saber and some karate moves.

“The connection is just unbelievable, and it’s more than you can really explain,” said his wife, Kerry Close.

In Mobile, Dawn Hicks, manager of telemedicine programs at the University of South Alabama hospital, set up the video conferencing equipment for Freedom Calls that was used by the Matthews couple.

On the opposite end of the state, Robert L. Middleton, a NASA retiree and senior research engineer at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, took the video and put it online.

Harlow commended several corporations for their contributions, particularly Lenovo Inc. for computers, Logitech International SA for webcams and FedEx Corp. for delivery of equipment to Iraq Freedom Calls Centers.

The technology was in place when Cynthia Matthews arrived at University of South Alabama Children’s & Women’s Hospital at 1 a.m. March 24. The video equipment was set up at 3 a.m., dad appeared on screen about 4 a.m. and remained on until about an hour after the baby’s 9:19 a.m. arrival.

The couple routinely stays in contact by e-mail and voice mail. But to witness the birth? “He’s just thankful for Freedom Calls,” she said.

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