The Hangar Z Podcast: Touching the Dragon With Jimmy Hatch, Part 2

By Vertical Mag | September 27, 2023

In to episode 101 of The Hangar Z Podcast, brought to you by Vertical Valor Magazine, host Jon Gray provides part two of his conversation with Jimmy Hatch, a former Navy Seal, founder of Spikes K9 Fund, and author of Touching the Dragon.

Hatch’s story is truly inspiring. He is a former Navy Seal, master naval parachutist, and he was involved in over 150 missions between Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia and Africa. Hatch was also an expert K9 trainer and handler as a Navy SEAL.  

Hatch writes about the battles he fought overseas as well as the battles he fought on the home front after being critically wounded while attempting to rescue Army deserter Pvt. Bowe Bergdahl. 

In Hatch’s book Touching the Dragon as well as in this conversation, Hatch courageously discusses the ever-important topic of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) by opening up about his own battle as he worked to heal from the career-ending gunshot wound that exploded through his femur, requiring 18 surgeries and 12 months of recovery in which he had to relearn how to walk.

Hatch talks about the nonprofit K9 organization he developed to protect our nation’s working dogs called Spikes K9 Fund.

As a K9 handler on several deployments, Hatch’s life was regularly spared by the work of K9s – one of the most memorable was Spike. And on Hatch’s final deployment, the night he was critically wounded, a K9 Remco spared his life while losing his own.

From that evening on, Hatch oriented his life around the training, care and preservation of working dogs. In addition to working as the founder and president of the fund, he works with local law enforcement to fine-tune their work. This may be one of the episodes you excuse the kids from.

The Hangar Z Podcast would like to thank its sponsors Metro Aviation, SHOTOVER, and CNC Technologies, as well as Patreon. 

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