Remembering Iraq | | Missile strike survivor - Robbie Stewart today |
In 1990 the BBC's Lincolnshire reporter, Tony Roe, filmed with an RAF navigator in the run up to the first Gulf War. Flight Lieutenant Robbie Stewart had visited a primary school at Scampton because the children had written to his Squadron while they were on training missions in Saudi Arabia. Most daily news stories would have ended there. But two days into the Gulf War Robbie was shot down. It was some time before anyone knew whether Robbie was alive or dead. Missile strikeRobbie had been on a low flying bombing mission over Iraq with his pilot Dave Waddington. Fifteen years after... | 1991: End of Gulf War. Iraq accepts a ceasefire but the departing army sets alight Kuwait's oil fields. 1993: US cruise missile attack on Iraq Intelligence HQ. 1994-95: Sanctions imposed. 1996: Iraq pushes tanks into Kurdish cities. 1997: Weapons inspectors row. 1998:- Operation desert fox. March 2003: Iraq war starts.
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When the missile struck their aircraft, Robbie managed to press the eject button with half a second to spare. The plane left a huge crater in the desert. Robbie suffered bad leg injuries and was captured. News of his capture was picked up by the BBC's monitoring unit at Caversham. The two people who'd handed him in to the Iraqi authorities had been praised in an Iraqi radio broadcast. Survival instinctsIt was only while under interrogation in the now notorious Abu Ghraib prison that Robbie found out his pilot had survived too.
They were in the same jail.  | | Prisoner of war Robbie Stewart in 1991 |
The treatment they suffered there was brutal. Robbie was struck with a pistol on the head and had a knife whipped around his face. At one point he had to run back to the safe haven of his cell with a wounded leg to escape a beating. Then when one of Saddam Hussein's bunkers was bombed near the prison, he was dragged outside, shown the damage, and told he was going to be shot. The day after the bombing, the land war started. Ten days later the conflict was over. Back home in Lincolnshire it was only clear Robbie and Dave had survived and were alive when pictures of them in yellow P.O.W. suits emerged. Road to recoveryThe same BBC crew who had filmed Robbie before he went to war went on to tell the story of his imprisonment and spent six months following his road to recovery. Robbie was determined to fly again and built up his strength while training navigators at RAF Cottesmore in Rutland. Then the day came when Robbie flew againÂ… and in a special moment Robbie returned to his old base at RAF Marham to team up with Dave Waddington to fly together again.  | | Last flight - Robbie takes to the skies once again | |
In the years that followed, the reporter, now working for Inside Out, and the Navigator kept in touch. So on his 60th birthday, when Robbie retired from the Air Force after 41 years, he invited the BBC along to witness his final celebration flight. Robbie was to fly one last time with Dave Waddington, now a Wing Commander at Marham. Not only that but his daughter, Kirsty, is now a Tornado pilot. She and her husband, Nick Moore, were to fly on the same mission with friends and family on the ground watching. The day didn't go according to plan; Kirsty's jet couldn't take off because of an engine problem. But it was still a special time for Robbie who said: "It was a fantastic day from the moment I drove in through the gates until the moment I closed my eyes that night".
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Inside Out - East Midlands: Monday October 30, 2006
