CAPTION: Rev'd Steve Jones joined the marines when he was just 16 before being deployed to the Falklands war

Devon Vicar Marks 40th Anniversary of Night He Was Saved in Falklands Bombing Raid

Posted: 24th May, 2022

A Devon vicar and former Royal Marine is preparing to mark the 40th anniversary of a Falklands bombing raid which killed two of his comrades.

Rev’d Steve Jones, who is Team Rector of Exmouth, Littleham and Lympstone, says he believes his life was miraculously saved in the attack at Ajax Bay.

He was just 16 when he joined the Royal Marines at the Commando Training Centre at Lympstone. Following training he qualified as a signaller before being posted to the Commando Logistics Regiment Royal Marines in Plymouth.

Steve Jones trained at RM Lympstone, the Royal Marines training base which is now in his mission community.

In April 1982, only three days after he arrived at his unit in Plymouth, the British overseas territory, the Falkland Islands, was invaded by Argentina. The Commando Logistic Regiment was sent south as part of the UK’s Task Force to retake the islands.

Air attack

Speaking to Premier On Demand’s Sunday Night Live with Pam Rhodes, he said on 27 May 1982 he had just come off duty when an Argentinian airstrike began without warning.

He recalled, “I saw two Argentine A4 Skyhawk jets come over the horizon heading directly for us. We hadn’t had the air-raid warning so they had taken us by surprise.

“I was completely on my own, there was no-one around me and I started running as fast as I could towards the galley building.

“I felt myself grabbed by an unseen force and turned 90 degrees to the left and propelled in that direction.

“I looked up and the nearest of the jets was just coming with its underbelly canon firing, chewing up the ground with the bullets. The jet was flying so low it felt like I could reach up and touch it.

“I saw it release a black 500 lb bomb and I just thought ‘I’m dead, it’s all over’.

Steve said the bunker he was heading to was full so he threw himself down on the ground nearby.

He said “The bomb landed on the building I had been heading to and killed my friend Paul who had just fed me supper.

“I felt the terrible force of the explosion and my other friend Colin was, very tragically, killed next to me.”

Shielded from the explosion

Steve said he felt like he had been shielded from the explosion. “I was unharmed apart from some tiny bits of shrapnel in my hands.

“It literally felt as if somebody was laying on top of me and shielding me.”

Steve proposed to his wife by telegram after the Argentine surrender. They’ve now been married 39 years.

As another air-raid warning sounded, Steve ran into an empty bunker: “I cried out to God. I knew that what the Bible said was true and there had to be more to life than this. I called out to God and God saved my life.”

“I have spent the rest of my life trying to explore Christianity and what faith means and why God saved me on that day.”

After leaving the marines, Steve became a police officer before training as a barrister. He later felt called to become a church minister, firstly in the Baptist church in the UK and America and then in the Church of England.

A time of deep reflection

His current mission community includes the Royal Marines training base at Lympstone.

Steve says the 40th anniversary of the attack will be a time of “deep reflection” after he recently found out the name of the Argentine pilot who bombed him and killed his friends.

“It makes the issue of forgiveness live and very vivid. However, God’s amazing grace is sufficient and his love overcomes all things.”

There are a number of events taking place to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Falklands War, including a service at St Andrew’s Church, Plymouth, to mark the start of Armed Forces week on Sunday 19 June at 3pm. It will be led by the Bishop of Plymouth. You can find out more here.

Watch Steve’s testimony in the video below (at 4.08″).

 

 

 

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