A lonely ODST (Halo 3)

In Halo 3 on what I believe is the level Cortana, there is a dead, uninfected ODST with a flamethrower in an out of the way location. I was wondering if there was any sort of Cannon explanation for his being there, or if it was just a gameplay thing?

Probably just an excuse to get a flamethrower in there somewhere.

ODST are never in the same levels as flood are they?

illuminati confirmed

He’s likely from the pelican that’s randomly parked there.

It is odd he’s not infected, but the level has a few non-infected bodies.

I’d imagine both of them are a remnant of the time where the level was actually the tail end of Floodgate.