'A Friend To All:' Lacey Remembers Captain Nicholas T. Giglio

LACEY, NJ — Residents gather every year to remember Captain Nicholas T. Giglio. Participants in the New Jersey Run for the Fallen stop in Lacey to honor him, and much of the community joins.

Giglio, a Lacey native and Air Force captain, died Oct. 15, 2009 in an aircraft crash over South Carolina. Today marks the 10-year anniversary of his death.

Giglio, 32, graduated Lacey Township High School in 1995. He dreamed of becoming an Air Force fighter pilot. While a student, Giglio participated in the Civil Air Patrol and several school activities, according to the NJ Run for the Fallen. He joined the marching band to be closer to a student who later became his wife.

After high school, Giglio began Air Force training while his future wife, Leigh, attended college in Pennsylvania. Despite the distance, the couple dated for five years and wed July 1, 2000.

"He proposed near a Ruby Tuesday in Scranton and read me a Valentine's Day poem, which asked me to marry him," Leigh said. "Our wedding day was just perfect and during the reception he and several of his ROTC buddies sang 'You've Lost that Loving Feeling' from that scene in 'Top Gun.'"

Giglio was known for his strong sense of duty to his country. He was first assigned to the McGuire Air Force Base after high school. He received a military scholarship in 1998, which allowed him to pursue a bachelor's degree in aerospace engineering at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Florida.

He was commissioned as an Air Force officer in 2003, receiving his Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training at Sheppard AFB, Texas, in 2004. He had been assigned to the 77th F-16 Fighter Squadron at the Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina.

Giglio died when his F-16 jet collided with another fighter pilot's aircraft. The crash occurred about 40 miles northeast of South Carolina. Giglio was a fighter pilot for 18 months and was in training for deployment to Iraq early the next year, according to the NJ Run for the Fallen.

Through his service, Giglio was "a wonderful husband, loving father, loyal son and brother, as well as a friend to all," according to his obituary. He and Leigh had a daughter, Grace. Leigh was pregnant with their second child, Caleb, when Giglio passed away.

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