PRIDE OF JEVENS FAMILY
POIGNANT MEMORIES AT IRISH AIR CORPS CEREMONY IN BALDONNEL
TEARS of joy and sadness mingled as 22-year old Wexfordman Christopher Jevens of Glynn received his military pilot’s wings from the Irish Air Corps at a ceremony in Casement Aerodrome, Baldonnel. CHRISTOPHER’S brother David, also an Air Corps cadet was tragically killed along with his instructor in a plane crash at Cornamona, County Galway during a training exercise in October 2009, shortly before he was due to be commissioned. He was 22 years old. FORMER CBS student Chris who was 15 years old when David died, had a similar teenage passion for planes and followed in his older brother’s footsteps by being accepted into the 32nd Air Corps cadet class of 2013 after a year studying Aeronautical Engineering in University of Limerick. HE was surrounded by his proud family as he joined eight fellow cadets in passing out after three years of training which included 750 hours of pilot ground school and 180 hours of flight training to prepare them for appointments as pilot officers in the Air Corps. ‘PREDOMINANTLY it was a day of celebration for Christopher and his achievement - the fact that he walked in David’s shoes which is what he always wanted to do- but it was also very much tinged with sadness,’ said his father Donal who attended the ceremony with his wife Liz; their daughter Sarah and son-in-law John; Christopher’s partner Rachael Kedney and their baby daughter Robyn (7 months); Donal’s brother Cormac and Liz’s brothers Maurice and Robert Whitty. THE memory of David Jevens was very much alive during the ceremony which was held in an airplane hangar with a special remembrance made during Mass celebrated in the Garrison Church where the cadets were blessed by the Air Corps chaplin and presented with pilot wings and inscribed bibles by their parents. GENERAL Officer Commanding of the Air Corps Lieutenant General Paul Fry also remembered David in his address while Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach and Defence Paul Kehoe referred to him in his speech. ADDRESSING the nine newly-commissioned Air Corps officers, Minister Kehoe said they had chosen a very challenging and demanding career but one that is also very fulfilling and rewarding. ‘I would like to welcome the families and friends of those who are being commissioned today, particularly Donal and Liz Jevens, proud parents of Christopher who is being commissioned today.’ ‘CHRISTOPHER is today following in the footsteps of his late brother David. I know this must be a day touched with sadness for the Jevens family but it is also a day of great pride in Christopher’s achievements,’ he said. CHRISTOPHER is now based in Baldonnel where he is due to commence helicopter training having completed his fixed wing training during the cadetship. The Chief Flight Instructor at the flight school in Baldonnel is Odhrán Murphy from Wexford. IT is not the first time that Don- al and Liz jevens have attended an Air Corps commissioning event. The Davidstown, Glynn couple were presented with David’s pilot wings posthumously at the 2009 commissioning ceremony whicht their son would have been due to attend and have been been invited to every ceremony since then. ‘WE have been asked to every commissioning ceremony since David died and we have attended them all,’ said Donal who travelled with Liz to Connemara in County Galway a few days after the Baldonnel ceremony on one of their regular pilgrimages to the remote and scenic mountainside location of Cornamona where David died.