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Mortgages paid in full for 2 Gold Star Families in Fayetteville

In honor of Memorial Day, the Tunnel to Towers Foundation has paid off the mortgages for two North Carolina families who lost their loved ones.

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Lt. Col. Christian Blevins
FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — In honor of Memorial Day, the Tunnel to Towers Foundation has paid off the mortgages of two North Carolina families who lost their loved ones.

The Tunnel to Towers Foundation shared this week that it paid in full the mortgages of two Fayetteville homes belonging to the families of Staff Sgt. Ronnie Sanders and Lt. Col. Christian Blevins.

Sanders was killed in action in Feb. 2007 at the age of 26 when a bomb detonated near his vehicle in Iraq. Blevins died of cancer in 2019. His cancer was believed to have been caused by exposure to toxic chemicals from burn pits.

Staff Sgt. Ronnie Sanders

Sanders was survived by his wife, Rachel, and their four children, including twin daughters.

After several rounds of chemo, radiation, and therapy, Blevins, a father of six, died shortly after meeting his newborn son.

“This Memorial Day is the first time in 20 years America’s servicemen and women are not in harm’s way on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan. These conflicts are over, but families are still dealing with the loss of husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, sons, and daughters. I ask all Americans to take a minute to think of these heroes and their families who have sacrificed so much over the last two decades,” said Tunnel to Towers Chairman & CEO Frank Siller.

This Memorial Day weekend, Tunnel to Towers paid off mortgages for a total of 21 Gold Star families in 16 states.

The foundation has set a goal to pay off 1,000 mortgages of military families by the end of the year. People can donate at T2T.org.

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