STERLING – After 47 years, Ray Torres still gets emotional when he talks about the day he was attacked during the Vietnam War.

“In that couple seconds, your whole life flashes before you,” he said Thursday with tears in his eyes.

Saturday, 47 years after he was critically injured when a grenade exploded within 3 feet of him, Torres will receive five replacement medals during a ceremony in Rock Island.

More than 30 of Torres' friends and family will travel to Rock Island for the event.

In 2011, Torres' story was part of “Vietnam in HD,” a documentary that aired on the History Channel.

Torres, 68, will receive a Purple Heart, the National Defense Service Medal, a Vietnam Service Medal, a Presidential Unit Citation, and a Combat Action Ribbon.

Congresswoman Cheri Bustos will present Torres with the medals. Torres and his family contacted Bustos' office for assistance in tracking down the service medals.

“It is truly an honor and privilege that my office was able to assist Ray Torres and present him with his Purple Heart and other medals," Bustos, D-East Moline, said Friday. "Ray served his country bravely during the Vietnam War and was injured in the line of duty. I thank him for his service and encourage other veterans who would like assistance locating replacement service medals to contact my office.”

Torres served in 1968, the bloodiest year of the Vietnam War, when 16,592 Americans died.

After he arrived in Vietnam in the fall of 1967, Torres, a 1965 graduate of Sterling High School, was assigned to a Marine Corps company that ran patrols around Phu Bai.

A few months later, he landed in the middle of America's longest battle of the war – the 77-day siege at Khe Sanh.

Torres, Navy corpsman with the Marines, was stationed in the dangerous trenches of Hill 861A.

On Feb. 5, 1968, the North Vietnamese Army hit a platoon hard, and Torres, trained as a medic, rushed to the scene. He found four Marines wounded by grenades. As he checked the men, all wounded or dead, another grenade landed in a foxhole and exploded less than 3 feet from him.

"I heard the grenade land, and I could not see it because it was dark, and I didn't know where it was," Torres said as he used a handkerchief to wipe tears from his eyes. "When it exploded, it picked me up and threw me against the wall."

He suffered a concussion, multiple injuries to both legs and an arm, and two ruptured eardrums. When he shielded his face, a nail went through his hand.

"If I would not have put my hand up, the nail would have hit me right in the face," Torres said.

The corpsman, who always tried to rescue others, screamed for someone to save him.

Through mortar, rifle and machine gun fire, and exploding grenades, another corpsman heard his cry. The soldier tried to drag Torres to the company aid station, but a large boulder stood in their way.

“To this day, I don’t know how I got over that rock,” Torres said.

Soldiers cut off Torres’ clothes to assess his injuries.

The Americans eventually overpowered the enemy there in hand-to-hand combat.

The next morning, Torres was loaded onto a Medevac helicopter.

"I was in the hospital in Japan, and I went to a hospital in the Philippines," Torres said.

To this day, Torres has ringing in his ears caused by nerve damage, as well as some hearing loss. A piece of metal is still lodged in one leg. He also struggles to sleep soundly.

After the war, Torres returned home to find out his father, Emilio, was suffering from bone cancer and had been given 3 to 6 months to live.

Rather than pursue his education, Torres took an early discharge from the military in 1970, just 3 months short of his 4-year tour, in order to care for his father.

Three months after Torres returned home, his father died at the age of 66.

"When you get out of the service like that, you don't have time to do anything," Torres said. "Once I signed my discharge papers, I was out of the military the next day, and that's why I didn't get my medals."

Overcome with emotion, decades passed before Torres talked about the Vietnam War.

"I just had a hard time dealing with it," he said.

Once his story documentary appeared on the History Channel, his family began pushing him to inquire about the honors he was due.

"He always wanted to get his medals," said his wife of 43 years, Caroline, 64. "Ray is more of a quiet person all around. Once the documentary ended, we said we need to get those medals because they are part of his legacy."

MEDALS CEREMONY