An area soldier is headed back to the United States after suffering injuries in Iraq.
A member of the 56th Stryker Brigade and Altoona native Matthew Gibbons suffered injuries to his face and upper body after his unit was attacked, his father Stephen Gibbons said Wednesday evening.
The elder Gibbons said his son could be back in the U.S. as early as this weekend.
The married father of two boys was deployed with the Detachment 1, Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 112th Infantry Regiment of the Pennsylvania National Guard.
Gibbons, a 2001 graduate of Altoona Area High School, was in Iraq about two months before he was injured, his father said.
''We're anxious to see him and be able to support him,'' Stephen Gibbons said.
