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‘We haven’t lost our vision’ — Blinded veterans taking on Georgia section of Appalachian Trail
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US Navy veteran Lonnie Bedwell, center, who is blind, wears a shirt that reads, "SUPPORT BLINDED VETERANS" at a gathering in Murrayville, on Thursday, May 31, 2018, the night before he and other veterans with visual impairments embark on a hike along the Appalachian Trail. The group of American and British veterans and their visual guides will be hiking sections of the trail on June 6, where they will end at Camp Frank D. Merrill in Lumpkin County. - photo by David Barnes
Blinded in combat, a group of American and British veterans don’t want their disability to deter them from doing as others do — and that includes hiking the Appalachian Trail. “We’ve all have lived through some traumatic change, and we are continuing to live through it,” said Steve Baskis, who lost his eyesight after being wounded by an improvised explosive device in Iraq in May 2008.