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For first time, infantry soldiers to undertake bomb disposal duties
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Infantry soldiers are to undertake bomb disposal duties for the first time in British military history, as the MOD scrapes the bottom of the barrel to make monetary savings. The job goes to the Royal Gibraltar Regiment, to relieve a handful of RAF personnel thus keeping the RAF complement in Gibraltar in check.
British Forces Gibraltar see this "as part of a changeover of military responsibilities within Gibraltar." In preparation for this change, three RG soldiers have made a little bit of British military history by being the first infantry soldiers ever to have been trained in Bomb Disposal techniques – in the past, only soldiers of the Royal Logistic Corps and the Royal Engineers have been trained in these skills.
It is not that the Gibraltar regiment are not capable of handling this task, far from it. Lance Corporal Malcolm Head, Lance Corporal Alfred Garro and Private Luke Schroeder didn’t just complete the Disposal of Conventional Munitions course, they all sailed through the final examinations, each scoring over 90%! By contrast, on the previous course, only half the students even gained the necessary pass mark of 70%. ‘We knew we would need to work hard so we disciplined ourselves to doing three hours extra study every single night,’ said Malcolm.
‘We are now trained to assist a Bomb Disposal Operator to deal with any conventional munitions,’ he added. ‘Our next step is to go back to the UK to attend a seven week course in the disposal of Improvised Explosive Devices. We would then be based on the Rock but, after a couple of years experience before we could volunteer for on operations in an Explosive Ordnance Disposal job. In those two years, we might be able to do an exchange with some UK-based troops to give us some wider experience.’
But why would anyone volunteer for such a dangerous job? ‘I volunteered straight away,’ said Luke. ‘It’s a different challenge and it’s a real specialism that no-one else in the infantry can do.’
‘We first heard in November that the Regiment was taking over responsibility for Bomb Disposal but we thought that it would be ages before anything took effect. In fact, we were asked before Christmas if we would be interested in the job and, by the second week in January, we were travelling to Chatham to start the training.’
Whilst waiting for their next course, the three soldiers are spending some time with the RAF Bomb Disposal team here on the Rock. ‘The RAF guys have been brilliant,’ said Malcolm. ‘They have been very supportive. They’ve shown us how to use and to maintain the Wheelbarrow and how to take X-Rays of suspect packages. It’s all been really useful.’
08-03-11
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