Mankin has had nearly 30 surgeries at the military's premier burn treatment facility, Brooke Army... 
(Steve Mankin)
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It took Cpl. Aaron Mankin six weeks after his injury in Iraq to finally look at himself in the mirror. What he saw brought him to tears.
"There's this stranger in the mirror that you couldn't imagine in your worst nightmare," he told ABC's Bob Woodruff. "I couldn't help but cry."
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Mankin, a 25-year-old Marine, was wounded in 2005 when the vehicle he was traveling in rolled over an improvised explosive device and exploded 10 feet in the air. Four Marines died in the attack and 11 others were injured.
"I was thrown back inside the vehicle and I knew that I was on fire right away," Mankin said. Assuming he would die, Mankin closed his eyes and concentrated on what he thought would be the last image he would ever see — the face of his girlfriend, Marine Lance Corp. Diana Kavanec.
Instead, he survived, though his injuries were gruesome.
"I woke up to the sound of my fellow Marines saying 'Put him out, put him out,'" said Mankin. In addition to the damage he sustained to his throat and lungs from smoke inhalation, he suffered intense burns on more than 25 percent of his body, leaving him severely disfigured and unrecognizable.
His ears, nose and mouth were so badly burned that they were essentially gone; he lost two fingers on his right hand.
Now, two years later, a unique partnership between the military and a team of doctors from UCLA Medical Center is working to give Mankin his face back.
He is the first patient in a program called Operation Mend, which will give returning service members with severe facial injuries access to the country's best plastic and reconstructive surgeons who work in the private sector.
"I think it's the private sector's duty to stand up if they have been fortunate enough and do something extra to help," said philanthropist Ronald Katz, who created the program and also serves on the board of advisers for UCLA Medical Center.
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