On Tuesday, January 23, the members and guests of the Vaga Probus Club were treated to an outstanding talk delivered by Mr Simon Davey MBE BEM entitled THE FALKLANDS WAR- A PERSONAL REFLECTION. 

Simon joined the British Army in 1976 and served with D Squadron 22 SAS for some 17 years as a trooper through Squadron Sergeant Major. He was subsequently commissioned and rose to the bank of Lt Col.

He talked about the various states of readiness operated by the Regiment in those early days and then took his audience through his deployment in 1982 as a result of Argentinian forces having landed on the Island of South Georgia.

In late April of that year, he was involved in the attempt to retake the Island which was seen as a clear statement of intent by the UK Government. It was during the initial attempt that Simon encountered his first helicopter crash, the result of bad weather conditions, fortunately he and his colleagues survived. 

The islands having been successfully retaken orders took him the Falkland Islands themselves where he was part of the raid on Pebble Island which was designed to confirm the presence of and destroy enemy aircraft. Over the period of just two hours, the raid was successfully completed with the destruction of 11 Argentinian aircraft. 

Simon sustained a shrapnel wound to the leg and was blown up by a landmine, luckily he was the only UK causality of the raid. 

Sadly, his war did not end there, along with members of his Regiment and other personnel he was being transferred from one ship to another when the helicopter being used was involved in an accident resulting in it ditching into the sea. Simon managed to escape the sinking aircraft and spend 45 minutes in the freezing water clinging with others to a one-man life raft.

He was pulled from the water by a rescue inflatable launched from HMS Brilliant, Simon was one of just nine survivors, the remainder of the 21 on board perished.