KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - The ambush that took the life of Sgt. Michael Starker unfolded within sight of a heavily defended Canadian forward operating base, much to the horror and dismay of his fellow soldiers and a long-time friend.
Master Cpl. Fabio Lacentra, 40, had known Starker for 10 years, serving with him both in the reserves and as emergency medical technicians in Calgary.
The sharp crackle of the fierce exchange was the first indication to troops at Masum Ghar, about 35 kilometres west of Kandahar, that something was up. "We could see it from where we were; we could see the firefight going on," said Lacentra, a medic with the 15th Field Ambulance evacuation platoon.
He was standing in the command post when the base commander ran out and mounted one of the bastion's walls to get a view of what was going on.
"You could see his concern," Lacentra recalled in an interview Thursday with The Canadian Press.
The radio began to chatter.
There were wounded.
How bad?
When the answer came back, Lacentra turned to the soldiers beside him.
"I said: 'You know a gunshot wound is never a good thing."'
His training as an ambulance technician had kicked in.
"We knew it was Canadians and I guess I was, without even consciously doing it, was trying to prepare these guys. I just said that kind of gunshot wound doesn't end up with a good result."
At the time, Lacentra didn't know it was his friend, the guy with whom he had worked out at the gym every day during training in Edmonton, the guy whom he clearly looked up to as a paramedic, a soldier and a person of "amazing character and strength."
Starker, 36, was evacuated by helicopter to the NATO military hospital at Kandahar Airfield along with a second unidentified soldier, who was also wounded. Doctors pronounced Starker dead at the Role 3 treatment centre.
The ambush on Tuesday, the first shooting death of a Canadian soldier in direct combat with the enemy in almost 20 months, is still under investigation by military police.
It was very quiet that evening in the vehicle when Lacentra drove with other troops back to the airfield, where the majority of Canada's 2,500 troops in Afghanistan are stationed.
Once in a while, the cheerful Italian-immigrant to Canada, who possesses an easy smile, likes to sing in the car.
"So when we got just close to KAF actually one of the guys said: 'Hey Fabio why don't you sing us a song."'
He did, but his heart was only in it for a few minutes.
His mind was on Starker.
"I kind of knew it was him, but I hoped it was somebody else. Right? That's not a good thing to say," he added with tears beginning in the corners of his eyes.
"I didn't believe it was him because I know how well trained Mike is. He's an ex-sniper. I just kept thinking it was someone else because there was no way Mike would get shot that way."
Back inside the wire, he heard the news from a nurse at the Role 3 hospital.
It struck like a bolt of lightning.
He had seen Starker only last Saturday when they spent four hours together unloading medical supplies.
Since his friend's death, Lacentra has spent a lot of time thinking about the ambulance calls the two of them occasionally went on together in Calgary.
There was the time Lacentra had been doing his practicum and wanted to impress both his instructor and Starker, who was driving, by inserting an intravenous line in patient as they were rolling back to hospital. They hit a bump and Lacentra missed.
"And I looked up and said 'Thanks' and he's looking at me. I pictured it the other day, I could see him. He had his face . . . turned looking at me with a crook smile."
Lacentra got the lesson: Don't be cocky.
"That was the kind of thing he'd do; he wouldn't tell you, don't do this and he wouldn't purposely try to make you fail, but when it did happen, just the look, you could see it on his face. I should have known better."
Starker, a reservist and ex-paratrooper, had personal reasons for returning to Afghanistan, Lacentra said.
"He didn't have to be here, but he wanted to serve," he said.
Lacentra, who served as a peacekeeper in 1992 as the Balkans was coming apart at the seams, is by no means naive about the risks.
But the sudden brutality of the ambush that killed his friend is hard to reconcile with the faces of grateful, dirt poor Afghans who cheer on the Canadians when they pass.
"Watching the firefight changed my perspective" about the country, he said. "It made things more real."
"You see lots of kids, waving at you; happy and smiling; even adults. And you don't feel there's any real danger. You know what's happened. You hear about some of the stuff that's happened, but you don't feel it at that moment in time."
