His motto is to just keep swimming.
Jason Redman was at death’s door following an Al Qaeda ambush in Iraq in 2007, during which he was shot eight times, sustaining severe injuries to his face, arm and body.
However, against all odds, the decorated Navy SEAL made it out alive, earning a Purple Heart for wounds sustained during the attack.
Now, still bearing the facial scars of that fateful day in the desert, he’ll defy the odds once again with another crucible — the annual New York City SEAL Swim 2025 on Saturday, a grueling, 3½ mile slog across the Hudson River, where he and others will battle the dangerous currents to raise money for charity.
“It’s a tough swim, it’s a real gut check — we have to rescue people every year,” Redman, 50, who will complete the event for the third time, told The Post. “Even Michael Phelps couldn’t swim against that current.”
The military man will be joined by hundreds more former SEALS, veterans, police officers, firefighters and other first responders who will make the aquatic trek from New Jersey’s Liberty State Park to Lower Manhattan — where they’ll participate in an “in formation” flag run, near the 9/11 Memorial.
Along the way, competitors will make pit stops at the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island — completing 100 pushups and 22 pull-ups each time.
Talk about an endurance test.
“I’ve done quite a few hard things since I was wounded, but I mean, this was probably one of the bigger things that I’ve done,” Redman confessed.
Nonetheless, he believes in the importance of the trial by water, which was started by former Navy SEAL Bill Brown in 2019 to honor fallen heroes, including those who lost their lives on 9/11.
It also raises money for the Navy SEAL Foundation, which benefits vets and their families — and financially supported Redman through his recovery.
While only 35 SEALS showed up to the inaugural event, this weekend’s swim is expected to draw 375 competitors — and raise a lofty $700,000 on top of the over $1 million raised to date.
“It’s an additional goal to keep me in shape and be involved in something that’s fun and makes an impact,” said Redman, who begins training at least six months out from the event and endures weekly workouts that include a mile-long swim and both 2,000- and 500-yard swims, hundreds of pushups, a lifting regimen, and rigorous outdoor and treadmill runs.
It marks an incredible, ongoing comeback for a man for whom survival — let alone distance swimming — once seemed impossible.
Redman’s journey to the Hudson began on Sept. 13, 2007, toward the end of a “highly impactful” deployment to western Iraq, where his colleagues ran numerous missions “to go after mid-level and high-level Al-Qaeda and insurgent leaders,” he said.
“My team and I walked into a very well-executed ambush,” Redman recounted of his life-altering, raging firefight, “and several of us got shot up by multiple machine guns.”
The lieutenant took two rounds in the elbow and multiple rounds off his helmet, with his night vision tube “shot off.”
When he turned to move toward his team, Redman “caught a round in the face,” he said.
“It hit me from behind right in front of the ear, stabbing through my face, took off my nose, blew out my right cheekbone,” said Redman, who lost consciousness during the ordeal, pinned down by gunfire. “It broke all the bones above my eye, broke the head of my jaw, shattered my chin, and it knocked me out.”
His team was rescued after an emergency strike from a gunship, and crews evacuated Redman and two wounded teammates to a hospital in Baghdad, where his condition was stabilized — but his struggle was far from over.
“It would take four years and 40 surgeries to put me back together,” said Redman, who teared up while recalling his significant injuries and long road to recovery.
Due to his obliterated elbow and inoperable left hand, doctors at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, first considered amputating his arm, but were ultimately able to save it.
Unsurprisingly, the toll wasn’t just physical.
“There is a natural tendency to want to get back to the same person you were before your injuries,” recalled Redman. “I’ll never forget the very first rehab session. I had no use in my left hand, and they wanted me to pick up these plastic cones that probably weighed half an ounce.
“I could not do it. I could not get my hand to work to grab this cone,” the wounded warrior said. “I would knock it over, and it was super frustrating.”
He eventually accepted that he’d “never be the same,” Redman lamented.
“My body’s been damaged too badly,” he said. “You’ve just got to figure out, ‘What’s the elite version of me right now?’ And that became the way forward.”
Redman has since made major strides, despite nerve issues and limitations involving mobility and his muscles — and is even able to do pullups and pushups again for the upcoming event.
He also learned to adjust to his limited range of motion in water, which he said felt like swimming with half an arm.
“I was not a freestyle swimmer, and the SEAL teams, we typically swim sidestroke or breaststroke,” he said. “But the way my arm’s configured, it actually works pretty good for freestyle.”
That’s how he’ll tackle the Hudson this weekend, and he ultimately hopes that pending success — not to mention his years-long journey — will set an example for others struggling with adversity.
“We all have failures. We all get knocked down; we all get broken,” he said.
“And for me, I’m living a second chance, and I’m hoping that it shows other people that, ‘Hey, you can do this, too.’”
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