MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Falklands, Eleven Veterans complete kayak and trek expedition to honor lost friends

The group of eleven Veterans rest as they finish their expedition (Pic Cockleshell22)

A team of veterans have completed an expedition to commemorate fallen comrades of the Falklands War. Former Royal Marine Tom Rendell, from Bristol, has led 11 men as they follow different actions the 3 Commando Brigade made during 1982 - from landing to freeing the capital Stanley.

The team completed expedition, from the Falkland Island's Mount Pleasant Airfield to Port Stanley, on the 20 February. Mr Rendell told the BBC the experience has been “emotional” for those who left good friends behind. “It's been an emotional return,” he said. “We went and visited the cemetery where many of those guys are buried, some of them killed directly alongside some of our team members.”

The 11-man unit, who have kayaked and trekked the route, consists of eight Falklands veterans and a four-man Royal Marine support team.

The challenge has been funded by the Cockleshell Veteran Expeditions organisation which aims to help improve physical and mental health of veterans through expeditions.

Mr Rendell said the voyage, which has seen the team survive a hurricane, has also commemorated the bombing of landing craft RFA Sir Galahad at at Fitzroy in June 1982. This became one of the defining images of the war and cost the lives of 32 Welsh Guards, 11 other soldiers and five civilian crew.

A member of the Cockleshell expedition, Jez O'Shea, was a 19-year-old landing craftsman in the Royal Marines at the time of the attack on Sir Galahad.

“It just so happened that his landing boat was just next to Sir Galahad when she was hit,” Mr Rendell said.
“He saw the bomb come over his head and into the side of Sir Galahad.
”His duty then was to get badly injured guardsman off the ship - some of them with burning flesh falling off them - and get them to the shores.
“That was what was happening in June 1982 and that's why we've come here today.”

The marine said the veterans have been touched by how welcomed they have been on the island since their arrival.

Mr Randell said: “When they come and see the way of life down here, in all honesty the guys feel their service in 1982 was all worth it.”

Over the expedition, the veterans have been raising money for the Stephen Jaffray memorial fund to help islanders who need medical treatment abroad.