His George Cross citation . . .

FOR his actions that day in August 2009, Staff Sergeant Kim Hughes was awarded the George Cross, equal to the Victoria Cross and the highest gallantry award for actions not in the face of the enemy.

The citation said: ‘Without specialist protective clothing in order to save time, Hughes set about clearing a path to the injured. On reaching the first badly injured soldier he discovered a further IED that constituted a grave and immediate threat to the lives of all the casualties.

‘Without knowing the location of the power source, but acutely attuned to the lethal danger he was facing and the overriding need to get medical attention to the casualties rapidly, Hughes calmly carried out manual neutralisation of the device. Any error would have proved instantly fatal. His utterly selfless action enabled all the casualties to be extracted and the bodies recovered.’

The citation goes on to describe how he then dealt with the rest of the bombs at the site in ‘the single most outstanding act of explosive ordnance disposal ever recorded in Afghanistan’.

‘That he did it without the security of specialist protective clothing serves even more to demonstrate his outstanding gallantry.’