The Flight Lieutenant Who Rescued A French Crew In Mali

Returning from a routine mission in Mali, Flight Lieutenant Aaron Kerry’s crew received a mayday call from a French helicopter in trouble.

"It was our last day in theatre. We were due to fly home that day," Flight Lieutenant Aaron Kerry from 18 (B) Squadron, RAF Odiham, said. 

"We were given a pretty routine task of picking up French troops from a base about 40 minutes or so away from our main operating base," he added.

"They'd had an engine fire and as helicopter pilot's engine fire is one of the worst things that can happen to us," Flight Lieutenant Tim Griffith said.

"They landed in the desert as a result."

After checking there was enough fuel, Flight Lieutenant Kerry made the decision to turn around and take both Chinooks to help the stranded crew.

Grounded and with engines out of action, the French helicopter was vulnerable to attack from insurgent groups who might be in the area.

"[Mali] is one of those places where you never really know where the enemy are," Flight Lieutenant Kerry said.

"Mali is a highly unstable country. There are vast tracks of land that are not controlled by anyone and a significant presence of what we call terrorist armed groups who have a relatively high degree of freedom of manoeuvre," Wing Commander Matt Roberts said.

"If you could imagine yourself sitting as a crew in a helicopter in the middle of nowhere, unable to take off again... you hope the cavalry is arriving. The cavalry in this case was a Chinook."

"The key point about what Aaron did, that was so remarkable, is not only have the flexibility of thinking in order to route directly to the helicopter, land on, knowing that he had the support at the back of the aircraft, but he also stayed on the ground providing support and reassurance to the French crew," he added.

Landing next to the stricken helicopter, Flight Lieutenant Kerry deployed the 50 French troops he luckily had on board, to stand guard while they waited for support.

Flight Lieutenant Griffith said:

"There was no question in his mind that we were going in to help them out."

For his efforts, Flight Lieutenant Kerry won the 'Hero Overseas - Individual' award at The Sun Military Awards.

Watch extended highlights of the Millies on Wednesday 12 February at 18:30 UK time on Forces TV, and at 19:10 UK time on BFBS Extra.