KEY POINTS:
Cyril Laurence Siegert took part in the critical glider operations on D-Day, June 6, 1944, his 190 Squadron Stirling hauling a giant glider that landed troops behind the beach-head at Normandy.
Three months later he flew several sorties in the disastrous campaign at Arnhem in eastern Holland when
British forces tried and failed to seize bridges over the Rhine, his aircraft among those dropping parachute troops on the opening day of the battle.
The day Siegert won his Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC), September 21, bad weather had grounded Royal Air Force fighter escorts and 23 of the 117 Stirlings and Dakotas trying to drop supplies to the struggling soldiers were shot down. A further 38 were damaged.
Siegert's Stirling was chased by several Focke Wulfs and after shooting one down he managed to shake off the others by a violent, high-speed dive.
Apart from Normandy and Arnhem, Siegert took part in many of 190 Squadron's special operations over France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Norway in direct support of the Allied armies in the field.
Siegert had a distinguished post-war record.
For two years from 1945 he was attached to the British Overseas Airways Corporation flying Dakotas to Cairo and West Africa. In 1949 he was linked to 24 (Commonwealth) Squadron, RAF, flying supplies to hungry Germans during the Berlin airlift.
In 1953 he was a member of the RNZAF team that flew a Hastings transport in the London-Christchurch air race. For that he was awarded an Air Force Cross, largely for his outstanding skills in keeping the aircraft aloft when one engine failed in a terrifying monsoon storm just off Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
The next year he captained the Queen's aircraft during the royal tour of New Zealand, for which he was created a Member of the Royal Victorian Order.
Siegert was on the NZ joint services team in Washington 1954-57, attended staff college in Britain soon after and served in Singapore as chief of staff of the ANZUK forces stationed there.
His tour of duty in Singapore and his service as deputy chief of air staff in Wellington was rewarded with a CBE in 1975.
He was promoted Air Vice-Marshal and appointed chief of air staff in October 1976, serving until 1979. He was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in the 1979 New Year Honours.
Larry Siegert, born in Fairlie in 1923, was educated at St Kevin's College, Oamaru. He enlisted in the RNZAF in March 1942, a few days short of his 19th birthday.
He is survived by two daughters and two sons.
- NZPA