A former squadron commander has retired as RNAS Yeovilton's community relations officer after a 50-year career with the Navy.
Commander Richard Seymour, 68, of Hardington Mandeville, joined the Navy in 1961 at the age of 18. At least six generations of his family have served the Royal Navy.
Cdr Richard Seymour with a Wessex helicopter similar to those he flew in 1968
He qualified as a commando pilot in 1967 at RNAS Culdrose in Cornwall and flew the Wessex and Wasp helicopters in his early career.
In 1972 he earned the Air Force Cross for rescuing 42 people from a grounded cargo ship during a tropical storm near Hong Kong. Flying a Wasp helicopter he returned to the stricken ship time and again so the crew could be winched to safety.
Cdr Seymour first came to Yeovilton in 1973, and commanded 846 naval air squadron in the late Seventies. It was the first squadron to have the Sea King helicopter; still in service today.
During the Falklands war Cdr Seymour was senior naval officer on the Merchant Navy ship SS Atlantic Causeway – a container vessel converted with a hangar and flight deck to carry aircraft to the conflict zone.
He said: "The Merchant Navy crew were absolutely brilliant. They did a wonderful job and saw ships close to them come under attack."
He returned to Yeovilton in the early Nineties to take up a job leading the flight staff and accident investigation centre.
In 1996, he took up a civilian post of community relations officer and has become a well-known figure in communities around Yeovilton where its helicopters regularly fly. He said: "It has been wonderful. A perfect job for me. I have been acting as a link between the air station and communities. It is very important for people to know what is going on at the air station and why we are doing it.
"People sometimes forget the air crews at Yeovilton have been operating in combat for more than ten years. This is not an exercise, these are roles where people are being shot at. They are operating in some of the most difficult conditions anywhere.
"I personally think it is really important for the general public to know that. Quite often they won't realise that the sort of training we are doing is preparing for this sort of operational role. "When they are exercising over the Somerset Levels and carrying out low-level night flights they are exercising as if it was Afghanistan. A few months later they will be out there doing it for real.
"The air station at the moment is far more operationally active than it was when I first came here. Every squadron has been involved in Afghanistan. In the last 15 years the operational tempo has never been greater." Cdr Seymour has a wife, Ann, and two adult sons.