Veterans recall the longest day few will forget

AGE HAS slowed their movements and time whittled down their numbers, but veterans of the Normandy invasion still gathered in Tauranga to remember their fallen comrades.
Among the D-Day survivors who gathered at the Historic Village on Saturday were nine veterans from the Bay of Plenty - five of whom were from Tauranga.
Tauranga's Ernie Cox, was part of The Buffs, an  infantry regiment turned into a flame-throwing tank unit.
The 86-year-old's unit was the only "crew" to survive the entire war. Mr Cox said he remembered D-Day "quite vividly".
"One of our tanks got into a bomb crater and was all sealed in so [the soldiers] couldn't get out. We lost a tank and five men before we even got to shore. A friend of mine was in that tank."
Mr Cox said he didn't have time to panic, or to be scared, but listening to the last post and ode during the church service on Saturday, Mr Cox said it took him back to that fatal day 65-years ago.
"People don't realise what we went through, it's very hard to imagine," he said.
Sometime after D-Day, Mr Cox was badly injured when trying to rescue soldiers in a tank next to his that was on fire.
As he and a comrade tried to pull a badly injured officer to safety, a shell flew between them and knocked their tank out.
Mr Cox received leg wounds and shrapnel wounds to his face. He spent a week in hospital and then returned to the unit, which received a new tank - that tank was later knocked out in Weeze, but no crew were injured.
More than 2000 French civilians and  4000 Allied soldiers died on D-Day, with thousands more killed in the campaign that followed.
The invasion involved 6500 ships carrying more than 250,000 soldiers. It remains the biggest amphibious military operation that has been carried out.
Saturday's memorial service in Tauranga was attended by Mayor Stuart Crosby and Tauranga MP Simon Bridges and his wife Natalie.
Waihi's George Hall, founded the Normandy Veterans' Association of New Zealand 26-years ago.
As a Royal Navy   mine sweeper, his crew left England before anyone else in order to sweep the mines from the American landing beaches codenamed
 Omaha and Utah.
It was a dangerous job, but as a mine sweeper Mr Hall received a shilling a day more than any other marine job.
"That would pay for three pints of beer," Mr Hall said fondly.
But the seriousness of the war, meant in hindsight, he was just lucky to have survived.
"It's a memory. I wouldn't like to do it again. [on D-Day] the sky was black ... When you are young, you think you are going to live forever," he said.
Together with his fellow veterans, Mr Hall had shared an experience that generations today never will. "These guys to me are like brothers."
Out of an original 10,000 New Zealand air and naval  personnel  at the battle of Normandy,  a third would have gone, Mr Hall said.
Eighty-three-year-old George Wootton, a  marine on a landing craft, said the combat in Normandy on D-Day was a massive operation that could never be repeated in today's time.
"There were so many people involved. Thousands and thousands. It is a day that people will never forget."
Mr Wootton said to be part of history was an "honour".
The full impact of what they were up against never really hit home because of their age. "We were so young."
Among those who were at the commemorative service on Saturday was 27-year-old Chrissy Arnold from Tauranga, whose father Ray Arnold, 84, was part of the Argyll Sutherland Highlanders  2nd battalion Special Purposes Corp.
In 1994, she, her father, mother Dilly Arnold, and brother Tony Arnold, travelled to the 50th D-Day anniversary in Normandy.
As someone relatively young, Ms Arnold said she had come to appreciate the sacrifices her father and his comrades made.
"At times he does get very emotional ... listening to some of their [the veterans] stories does make you very sad. 
"There are windows where you can talk about it, and times when it's just too hard."
She said she believed the younger generation would never really be able to understand the true sacrifice veterans made.
A section of young people today were focused on being "boy racers and making trouble".
"These men were 18 and on occasion even lied about their age to get into war. No, I don't think we really do understand," she said.