Some truly amazing stories amongst the honours list announced today.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17476534
A special mention must go to Sjt Deacon Cutterham who’s just as “fearless” on his bike 😉
http://news.sky.com/home/uk-news/article/16194628
A British soldier who picked up and threw away a live grenade before it could kill him and his men is among 131 members of the Armed Forces whose heroics are being officially honoured.
Serjeant Deacon Cutterham was wading through an irrigation ditch knee-deep in water on patrol in Helmand province, Afghanistan, when the grenade came flying over a high wall to one side and landed in front of him.
He reached down to grab it and “posted” the grenade into a parallel irrigation channel to get it out of his hand as quickly as possible.
He said the “unbelievable” explosion immediately afterwards ripped out half the bank of the adjoining ditch, and said it would have killed him and probably at least one of his soldiers.
The 28-year-old, from Bristol, said: “I heard the ‘ching’ of the fly-off lever coming off it. It all happened so fast but so slowly.
“I just went into autopilot. I shouted ‘Get down, grenade’, ran forward, grabbed it first time and just let go of it.
“I can’t believe I didn’t lose my fingers because as soon as I let go of it, it exploded. If I had missed it, it would have been game over.”
He added: “I’m comfortable around grenades and things like that. I know it sounds crazy but I am. It didn’t faze me picking up a grenade.”
Sjt Cutterham, of 1st Battalion the Rifles, had just been promoted to the rank of serjeant after his friend, Colour Serjeant Kevin Fortuna, 36, also of 1 Rifles, had been killed by an improvised explosive device the day before.
He is one of two people to be awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross, one level down from the Victoria Cross, in the Operational Honours List
