Marine Corps Lance Corporal Dylan Merola

Marine Corps Lance Corporal Dylan Ryan Merola, 20, of Rancho Cucamonga, California, served with the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, at Camp Pendleton. He was killed on August 26, 2021, when an ISIS-K suicide bomber attacked Abbey Gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. He had been in Afghanistan for less than two weeks, helping evacuate civilians.

LCpl Merola was born April 23, 2001, in Upland, California. He graduated from Los Osos High School in 2019 and enlisted in the Marine Corps, inspired partly by two great-grandfathers who had served during the Korean War. Kabul was his first overseas deployment. After completing his military service, Dylan hoped to attend college, study engineering and purchase his first car.

According to his platoon sergeant, Dylan had just lifted a child over the airport gate to safety and was returning to help another person when the bombing occurred. His mother, Cheryl Rex, remembered him as a young man with a heart of gold whose smile illuminated a room. She said, “Live to honor others, and that will honor Dylan. Live like Dylan.”

Dylan was survived by his mother, a brother and sister.