Petriken and another soldier were escorting a convoy in a Humvee when a heavy equipment transporter crossed the median and struck their vehicle.
Brett Petriken joined the Army in 1991. He was killed May 26 — a day before his 31st birthday — in a vehicle accident involving his Humvee, which was leading a convoy.
"He loved to watch them, win or lose," said his stepmother, Kathy Petriken.
He also loved a good joke, and knew how to make people feel at ease, said his uncle, Dave Petriken. "Nobody had a bad word to say about him," he said.
Petriken, 30, from Flint, Mich., and stationed in Germany, was killed in a traffic accident May 26 in Iraq.
Just before he left for Iraq, he told his mother not to worry.
"He said 'I have a bulletproof vest and a bulletproof Humvee. Mom, I'm trained for this,'" Deborah Petriken said.
Jeff Blanchard, a former high school substitute teacher, said Petriken was "just a clean-cut, polite, nice young man."
"You never had to ask him to be quiet, you never had to ask him to sit down," he said. "When it's that quality of an individual, it really hurts."
Petriken is survived by his wife, Christina, and 8-year-old daughter.”