Army Pfc. Kristofer Thomas, 18, Roseville; among 8 troops killed in helicopter crash

When Kristofer Thomas was 15, he told a recruiter that he wanted to join the Army.

For most kids, it could have been a boyhood whim. But Thomas never wavered from his pledge. He graduated from high school in the Sacramento Valley city of Roseville a semester early so he could enlist a month after his 17th birthday. Within months, he became the youngest-ever member of the Army Rangers, an elite, highly trained special operations unit, and soon was deployed to Afghanistan.

On Feb. 18, the 18-year-old private first class and seven other special operations soldiers were killed when their CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter crashed in Afghanistan’s Zabol province, south of Kabul. He was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment at Ft. Benning, Ga.

Thomas’ friends and family members say he had an unusual drive, sense of purpose and social consciousness.

In his 2005 senior project report at Roseville High School, Thomas wrote that he questioned the reasons why the United States was at war in Iraq but felt compelled to join the military to help the many Americans fighting overseas.

“I came to the conclusion that the people fighting for us are everyday people, my brother Nic included. I don’t want to just sit back and watch the casualty numbers climb on CNN. I need to do something to help out. That’s why I signed up for the Army,” he wrote. “There are always others willing to make a choice for the greater good of society to fight for the right of those who need them most. Whether it be a fight in the field or a battle against AIDS, whatever the case may be, we need people who help those who are oppressed.”

Thomas’ mother, Deborah Getz, didn’t know that her son had written the report until his economics teacher, Kathy Enos, brought it to her after his death.

“He was one of our finest students I’ve had the honor to teach,” Enos wrote in a note.

Army Sgt. Terry Phillips, who had recruited Thomas and his older brother, Nicholes Doan, and became close friends with the family, said in a eulogy that Thomas had a “seemingly unswerving drive” and was a consummate prankster with “a sparkle in his eyes and slight smirk on his smile.”

Thomas’ brother was sent to Iraq at age 18, returning last year just after Thomas had left for boot camp. Thomas missed his own high school graduation ceremony because he was so eager to start training.

More than anything, Thomas wanted to join the Rangers, a specially trained and equipped light infantry unit that can deploy anywhere in the world with 18 hours’ notice. Known for executing complex, lethal operations, the Rangers are the Army’s premiere raid force, often the first to storm an airfield or other key terrain. Their creed proclaims that “as a Ranger my country expects me to move farther, faster and fight harder than any other soldier.”

Thomas’ brother told him that he wouldn’t make the Rangers, that the screening and training were too demanding. But that motivated Thomas even more, and he immersed himself in boxing and martial arts to get in shape.

After completing 15 weeks of intensive training, he was sworn in as a Ranger, donning the special tan beret two weeks before he turned 18. The Army told him that he was the youngest to join the special regiment.

“If you gave Nic a challenge, whatever it was, Kris would try to do it better,” their mother said.

Two Rangers who survived the helicopter crash -- Thomas’ staff sergeant and another private first class -- wrote about Thomas’ “zeal to learn” and “drive to succeed” in a eulogy read at his funeral.

“His leaders were certain that Pfc. Kristofer Thomas would succeed as a Ranger,” they said. “He was a ‘rookie,’ but in his short time with the squad he earned the confidence of his leaders that he took being a Ranger very seriously.”

Thomas had been in Afghanistan for six weeks before he was killed in the crash, which also took the lives of another private first class from his battalion, five soldiers from an Army special operations aviation regiment and an airman from an Air Force special operations command. Fourteen others were injured.

The cause of the crash is under investigation. The pilot reported sudden engine trouble before the helicopter crashed.

Thomas’ mother recalls that once, during training, her son’s parachute didn’t open. “Hey Mom, I almost died today,” he told her. “I said, ‘Honey, you’re too young to die,’ ” Getz said. But he told her “it’s the risk that you take” as a Ranger.

On the day he was deployed, Thomas sent her a dozen roses. “I love you with all my heart,” he wrote on a card. “Don’t be worried when I’m gone. I’m with the best and I’ll be safe. Love, your son Kris.

In a February phone call, he told her it was cold and icy, and that he and his fellow Rangers had just built a 10-foot snowman. Three days before he died, Thomas sent his mother a Valentine’s Day e-mail.

Thomas’ mother now worries because her other son -- now home on emergency leave -- is scheduled to be deployed back to Iraq in July. She and her son Nicholes plan to ask the Army to reassign him to noncombat duty under a “sole survivor” clause that applies when a sibling dies in the line of duty.

“I’m very scared right now, not knowing what the Army will do,” Getz said.

She said she is not bitter toward the Army but believes that her family has sacrificed enough. “I will fight for my other son not to be deployed,” she said. “I only have one child. If Kris came back alive, and Nic had to go, I’d be OK with that. But I only had two children and one’s been killed.”

In addition to his mother and brother Nicholes, Thomas is survived by his stepfather, Eddie Getz; his father and stepmother, Rodney and Ramona Thomas; and a younger brother, Mason Thomas of Lincoln, Calif.

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marla.cone@latimes.com