Harry has a cold one with the troops on Valentine’s Day
With his pregnant bride at home, Duke makes do with wedding day pictures in sub-zero exercise in Arctic
IT IS a brave husband indeed who misses his first Valentine’s Day as a married man to fly to the Arctic Circle and spend time with the lads.
But if the Duke of Sussex was missing his wife as he visited a military base in north Norway yesterday, his mischievous comrades more than made up for it.
Troops stationed at Bardufoss for extreme cold weather training decorated the inside of a snow shelter especially for the Duke, pinning up printed pictures from his wedding day and lighting candles for an experience he declared – with a healthy amount of scepticism – “romantic”.
The Duke, who was there in his new role as Captain General Royal Marines, seemed amused by the gesture, falling easily into his old military banter as he interrogated servicemen on whether they had remembered Valentine’s Day early enough to send flowers home and avoid getting into trouble.
Spotting the wedding photographs inside the quinzee shelter, a type of igloo dug out and used in emergencies to stay alive in the snow, the Duke told L/cpl Lee Lovack and air engineering technician Kevin Burns: “You weirdos! Nice. It’s very kind of you to invite me into your ... er ... private shrine, or whatever you want to call it.”
Hearing the “chill-out music” and candles also put on for the occasion, he added: “Romantic, isn’t it?”
The Duke, who flew back to England by charter plane in time for a Valentine’s Day dinner with the Duchess, spent three hours visiting Bardufoss. He admitted he missed his days as an Apache helicopter pilot as he was given a tour of Exercise Clockwork, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary of training the Navy, Army and Air Force to provide aviation support to those who operate and fight in temperatures as low as -22F (-30C).
Given a briefing on the history of the training programme, the Duke was shown footage of servicemen undergoing survival training by dropping through a hole in the ice into freezing water to learn how to climb out again.
As the snow fell in temperatures of around 14F (-10C), he was then invited to inspect the four-man, 10-man and 16-man tents used during training, with avalanche rescue gear and a 45kg Bergen backpack.
Spotting Cpl Chris Anderson, of the RAF, dressed in a white, snow-camouflaged suit over his uniform, with a mask, the Duke joked: “You look as though you’re loving it.” Inside a tent, he attempted to lift the 45kg bag containing a full kit before thinking better of it.
Sgt Ads Lesley, who gave the Duke a tour, said he had been “really keen to engage” with personal questions about the troops’ welfare.
“Did you all get your other halves a card and some flowers?” Prince Harry asked, as he was introduced to a group of Royal Navy and Royal Marine personnel in an aircraft hanger.
Mock grimacing, he added: “There were a few guys out there who said they don’t bother any more …”
Seeing the Merlin, Wildcat and Apache helicopters on display, the Duke confessed: “I miss my pilot days.”
Major Huw Raikes, from the Army Air Corps, said: “It was a fun period for him. He misses the experience he had flying it, he misses the brotherhood. He’s got a very special relationship with the Army Air Corps.”