Fox News’ Johnny “Joey” Jones may be a Fox News personality now, but once upon a time, he was making headlines himself after a horrific accident during his days as a Marine stationed in Afghanistan. Making matters even more heartbreaking, the moment his life changed was captured on camera.

As many will likely know, Jones is a double amputee, and lost both legs after standing on an improvised explosive device, or IED, in 2010. A few months prior, he’d been interviewed by ABC’s “Nightline” and even shared some haunting words. “A good day is us being bored and training Marines how to find IEDs. A bad day is coming out here and doing our job, and something going wrong,” he said. Jones continued to update the reporters over the following months, and shared that things on the ground had become a lot more tense. In the days before the deadly explosion, CBS News had followed him and his colleagues around — and heartbreakingly, the news outlet also captured the gut-wrenching footage of Jones and his colleague Daniel Greer being carried away on stretchers.

Jones has spoken to many outlets about the immediate aftermath of the explosion. Speaking to “Nightline,” he recounted, “When I landed, I wasn’t feeling pain yet, but I knew what had happened. My face felt swollen automatically, and I could see my legs were gone. So I knew that, maybe just by the blood loss I had received so far, I might not make it.” Luckily for Jones, he did make it — and speaking to the “Nightline” reporters while at the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland, he shared a heartwarmingly positive take on it all. “I didn’t lose my legs. I was given a second chance at life,” he said.

Joey Jones’ recovery was a tough one

ABC/Johnny Joey Jones/YouTube

Of course, while Joey Jones was grateful to be alive, there’s also no question that the explosion and its aftermath were incredibly hard on him. From a physical standpoint, he shared that coming off the strong medication he’d initially been prescribed, the pain was agonizing. Even so, he shared that the psychological effects were far harder to take. Speaking of the phantom pains he experienced after his amputations, he shared, “Sometimes it felt like someone was twisting my foot around … trying to pop it off,” adding, “Phantom pains are excruciating pains, the ones that you can’t put a hand on it and say, ‘Oh, that hurts,’ you know, feel it … it’s just horrible.”

Another horrific outcome of the blast was the news that Daniel Greer had succumbed to the injuries he sustained in the blast. Several months after the explosion, he shared with “Nightline” that it was incredibly difficult for him to come to terms with his colleague and friend’s tragic death. “I think about him every day. And there’s no amount of emotion that could ever take that away,” he shared. Jones also shared that he couldn’t get past his feelings of survivor’s guilt. “I know I didn’t do anything wrong, but maybe I didn’t do enough stuff right,” he mused.

Jones summed up his feelings on recovering while Greer wasn’t able to in a beautiful yet devastating statement. “Life gets easier, the prosthetics get easier. Understanding that Corporal Greer is gone for good doesn’t. It never will. Never,” he said.

Joey Jones has made a point of honoring Daniel Greer’s memory

Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

In the years since Joey Jones told “Nightline” he’d never get over Daniel Greer’s death, he joined another news outlet in a professional capacity as a contributor for Fox News. True to his word, though, he never forgot his fallen colleague.

In Fox News’ 2022 commemoration of Jones’ “Alive Day,” he shifted the focus to Greer’s life. “I’m the guy on TV. It’s easy to draw attention to myself about my Alive Day,” he began before sharing that he was officially hijacking the segment to talk about Greer. Jones shared that Greer had been a new husband and father when he signed up for the Marine Corps Reserves. He then reiterated what happened on that fateful day in 2010, sharing that it hadn’t been an alive day for everyone. “When I stepped on an IED, it took my legs — it took his life,” he said. Jones also gave Greer a shout-out not just for saving his life the day of the blast but for continuing to do so in the years that followed. “Daniel died protecting me that day, and I have to believe I’m sitting here learning how to talk for a living ’cause he’s still doing it,” he gushed.

In 2024, Jones once again used his alive day to speak about Greer and made a heartbreaking revelation. In a post to X, previously known as Twitter, he shared, “Today is a day of reflection and some sadness but not a celebration.” Jones wasn’t wrong when he said he’d never heal from the passing of his colleague. Even so, it’s extremely moving seeing how committed he’s been to using that pain to bring constant attention to Greer’s sacrifice, and we’re wishing him peace.

Joey Jones was devastated by his father’s passing

Sadly for Joey Jones, in 2019, he lost another loved one. His father passed away that December, and Jones made no secret of how heartbroken he was.

Jones reached out to his Instagram followers on the day of his dad’s death, asking for prayers. “He’s taught me a lot … I hope I’ve taught him to stay alive even when they think you can’t. Please pray for my daddy. I need him for a little while longer,” he wrote, sharing a sweet collection of images from over the years. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be, and later that day, he shared the news that his father had passed away. A few months later, Jones shared some truly devastating details regarding what had happened that day and revealed that he had witnessed his father’s death and tried to administer first aid to save his life. “Dad died in December here in my floor. I did CPR on him till the paramedics got here and I pulled the plug on him the next day,” he shared in a post to X.

Over the years, Jones has continued to share sweet memories of his dad. In 2021, he shared more pictures of them together to Instagram with another heart-rending caption. The standout line? “I need you more now than ever,” the Fox star wrote. The following year, on what would have been his dad’s birthday, he shared a slightly funnier, yet emotional nonetheless, caption. “The only thing he held tighter than a brick trowel (or a beer/cigarette) was the ones he loved,” Jones penned. Suffice it to say, Jones’ relationship with his father was a tight one, and we can imagine how tough the loss was on him.

Joey has also lost countless other loved ones

Terry Wyatt/Getty Images

In June 2024, Joey Jones got incredibly vulnerable on X, opening up about all the losses he’d faced over the span of 15 years. First, Jones wrote, was his grandfather, who had died when he was 22. Then, he began his military service. Though Jones has spoken extensively about how much Daniel Greer’s death affected him, in his X post, he shared that there had been many other friends who passed away while serving their country. That still wasn’t all, though.

Jones went on to share that the very same year he lost his dad, both his maternal and paternal grandmothers died as well. “It’s been a steady trickle since,” he wrote. “One of my two closest uncles has a few months left, and today another uncle died of a heart attack,” he added. A few months later, he shared that the uncle who had been given months to live had succumbed to his illness in an episode of “The Five.” “I got a text today from my uncle Jeff, and my dad’s biggest little brother, my uncle Troy, passed away from cancer,” he told viewers. Much like he had with Daniel Greer, Jones used his platform to shine a light on his late uncle’s life, joking about how much taller he had been than his dad and marveling at the fact that he’d been the first of his family to have gone to college. “We love you, Troy,” he ended his tribute.

Jones ended his X post by writing, “Perhaps the worst part of aging are these seasons of death. From 22- 37 my entire social construct has felt as if it’s going extinct. I hope it eases soon.” We hope so, too, and we’re keeping Jones and his family in our thoughts.