Max’s moving stag party at WWII crash site
A GROOM-to-be spent his stag party hauling a bench more than 600 metres up a Kerry mountain to commemorate his German grandfather who crash-landed there during the Second World War.
Max Kyck, 37, of Bettystown, Co. Meath, spent three hours heaving the bench up Mount Brandon last weekend, helped by his father Kurt Jr, 65, and six friends. The bench was placed beside wreckage from the Focke-Wulf Condor and is inscribed: ‘Erected to commemorate the unexpected arrival of my grandfather Lt Kurt KW Kyck in Ireland on August 20, 1940. All survived that day on Fatha Ridge, Mt Brandon. Have a rest and consider why and what for.’
Max said: ‘My granddad was a 20-yearold radio operator in the Luftwaffe and crash landed while on a reconnaissance flight. He was interned in the Curragh Camp where he met my grandmother Lili White who lived locally.’
Kurt and Lili married in 1944 but after the birth of their first child, Kurt was deported back to Germany. After five years, the couple were reunited in Ireland and had two more children.
After a toast, the group did end up on a traditional stag: fishing then a night out.