Mobile family has ties to Ft. Hood

MOBILE, Ala. - For one family in Mobile, the shooting at Fort Hood hit close to home.

Cheryl Cotton's cousin, 34-year-old Nicholas Barrett, along with his wife and children, have been stationed in Killeen, Texas for the past eight years.

Barrett was at Fort Hood when the shooting started Thursday afternoon. Cotton got the news when she was checking her email.

"My heart sank. I mean just sank. And I grabbed the phone and tried to call his wife Donna Gail, and got nothing but a busy signal," she said.

Cotton checked to see if Barrett was online. But he wasn't. So she continued trying to call his wife. She says ten minutes later, she finally reached her.

"She actually, until the first person called her, had not heard anything. She was in the back yard playing with her children," said Cotton.

Donna Gail said told Cotton she had just gotten off the phone with her husband. She told her he was safe. He was across the street from the sports complex, where the shooting occurred, and didn't even know what was going on.

Cotton said Barrett and everyone else on base was on lockdown for hours.

She said, "I'm just praying for those families.. This is a sad situation. Friendly fire is the worst of all."

Cotton's cousin isn't the only member of her family in the Military. This past August, she picked up her 18-year-old son from basic training at Fort Seal. He will be deployed in seven months. She said just like Barrett, joining the Military was always what her son wanted to do.