(LEX 18) — As the conflict continues, a Pikeville man is sharing his first-hand accounts from Israel when Iran sent its first missiles to the country over the weekend.
Tommy Chamberlin is a Square Supervisor Tel Shiloh Excavation with Associates for Biblical Research. He had been in Israel since Monday, May 30.
"This would be my sixth season of excavation experience in Israel," said Chamberlin. "And our site has remains running from the Bronze Age through the Islamic period. Of course it's best known for references in the Hebrew Old Testament."
Chamberlin, along with dozens of others, had spent weeks digging up historic discoveries. But what happened in the days to come nobody could have prepared for.
"We had, I think it was at least 3 air raid sirens, it might have been 4, that night with the barrage of missiles that Iran responded with," Chamberlin said. "I was actually speaking with a friend back here in the States on social media, and he advised me that Israel had just struck Iran."
Friday will mark one week since Israel launched a major attack on Iran. Israel said it was targeting Iranian nuclear and military facilities. In retaliation, Iran launched over 100 drones toward Israel.
Chamberlin didn't witness much, but does recall one moment in particular.
"Probably minutes from leaving the country, we got to see an interceptor rocket," he said. "I would estimate a mile or two from our location, take off to intercept what we assumed was a drone coming into the southern part of the country."
Chamberlin says it was an immediate question: what do they do next?
"I got an email, my flight's canceled," said Chamberlin. "We were aware that if we wait for a flight out of Israel. We may be looking at at least a week or two, if even then. So it became very apparent that we weren't leaving by a flight out of Israel anytime soon."
Along with a film crew, Chamberlin made the journey to Egypt.
"We crossed the Egyptian border down near Ela, Israel, and made the travel to Cairo," he said.
Chamberlain says it took seven or eight hours to travel to Cairo before they came across road closures and had to turn around.
"Later that night when we did get to the Egyptian border."
Chamberlin kept many of his friends and family up to date on Facebook asking for prayers during this time.
"The prayer and just positive support was humbling and overwhelming," said Chamberlin. "It's a very difficult situation, and the support from the community, uh, friends, family, and others was, uh, wonderful, uh, and hard to express what it meant to me."
Once it's safe to return, Chamberlin and the team will be right back there to dig up history once again.
Three dozen members of that team are still in Jerusalem, preserving what they can of the site before they head back on Saturday.
