JUNE 11, 2026 – When a service member passes away in the line of duty, few think about what comes after the funeral and what life looks like for the family left behind. Survivor Outreach Services (SOS) is a nationwide military program across all military branches that supports and uplifts the families of deceased service members.
Joe and Leslie Cribben have been active in the SOS community on Fort Carson since 2018. After the death of their son, Sgt. 1st Class Stephen Cribben, a Soldier in 2nd Battalion, 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne), SOS helped them and their grandchildren stay connected to the military community, other survivors and, in some ways, Stephen.
“He loved everybody,” Joe Cribben said. “He had a very kind heart. We raised both our children to be sheepdogs. When he was in high school, he looked after people who either couldn’t defend themselves or wouldn’t defend themselves.”
While on deployment in Logar Province, Afghanistan, in November 2017, Stephen Cribben and his team came under fire from enemy forces while returning from a mission. Part of the team was caught in a wadi, or dry riverbed canal.
Stephen Cribben moved his vehicle to create cover while providing suppressive fire with a machine gun when he was fatally shot.
When the casualty assistance officer came to the Cribben’s home in California alongside a military chaplain, Joe Cribben knew immediately that his son was gone.
“We were actually out in the backyard with my granddaughter — she was just learning how to ride a bike,” Joe Cribben recalled. “I thought I heard the knock at the door, and since we were in the backyard, we didn’t really hear it. When I turned the corner, I knew.”
The Cribbens moved from California to Colorado to be closer to their daughter-in-law and grandchildren. Here they became part of the Fort Carson SOS.
The SOS has existed under the Army Community Service since 2008.
James Kilpatrick, Survivor Outreach Services support coordinator at Fort Carson, describes SOS as the long-term case management program after a family has gone through the Casualty Assistance Center. He and other support coordinators help the spouses, children, grandparents and siblings of Soldiers who pass away while on active-duty status regardless of how they died.
Gold Star families’ information is entered into a national database where support coordinators like Kilpatrick can view and manage individual cases within their jurisdiction. The Fort Carson SOS manages over 1,500 family members across nine counties in Colorado.
“Every county in the United States is covered by a support coordinator,” Kilpatrick said. “That means that we’re assigned counties, so any survivor that falls within the lines of those counties, we have a responsibility to that family member.”
Where a family receives SOS support is dependent on where they live, not where the service member died or was stationed.
“Say a Soldier at Fort Drum, New York passes away, but his family is here, that would become our case because we support the families where they’re at,” said Kilpatrick.
The SOS assists families by providing both government and non-governmental resources, installation access for SOS programmed events and managing milestones and deadlines that help Gold Star members maintain benefits.
“For a spouse receiving a benefit from Department of Finance and Accounting, there may be some requirements to maintain that benefit, and if you don’t file certain paperwork by a deadline, benefits can be suspended or shut off,” he said.
Over the years Kilpatrick has even supported families of deceased service members in nonconventional ways like attending college and high school graduations of family members.
“We have the responsibility to communicate with them throughout the years,” Kilpatrick said. “We get to watch families grow.”
SOS hosts holiday parties, grief gatherings and life skills classes such as cooking, crafts, automotive maintenance and financial readiness.
“I’ll get with the auto skills center and set up a car care class for the spouses in wintertime, because they’ll have vehicle maintenance needs and maybe it was their spouse who used to do those things,” Kilpatrick said.
Kilpatrick said he has learned that no family member is the same. Often their needs are unique, and everyone handles grief differently.
“We don’t look at anybody and put them in one basket; we look at them individually, independently,” he said.
Kilpatrick said his job is to listen to survivors, assess their needs and help them stay connected to the SOS community.
According to Joe Cribben, connecting Gold Star families to the community is what Fort Carson SOS is best at.
“They let us know if something is going on here on post,” he said. “They’ll invite us to participate. The last couple summers or so, they’ve held a fishing event for kids near Gate 19.”
Joe Cribben brings Stephen’s children out to SOS family events so they can connect with other kids like them.
“The children of these Gold Star families get to meet each other and interact,” he said.
Leslie Cribben said the SOS community is invaluable because it understands things that many won’t.
“They’re very non-judgmental,” she said. “If you want to laugh, you get to laugh. If you want to cry, you get to cry. Nobody judges how you feel or where you are in your grief process, because we all go through it differently.”
Despite missing her son daily, Leslie Cribben has found family in community.
“It’s not like a family; it is a family,” she said. “We’re here to just support each other to get through this process that none of us really want to be in. It’s important knowing that you’re not alone.”
For Leslie Cribben, the sacrifice of Gold Star families is lifelong, and the SOS on Fort Carson honors that.
“Our sacrifice is 24/7,” she said. “It’s not just on the anniversary of their death or the anniversary of their birthdate. We, as the little community that we are, understand probably better than most what the cost of our freedom is, and people forget. We can’t let them forget.”
Story by Brea DuBose
Fort Carson Public Affairs Office