ONE OF the country’s best known parachute display teams are set to celebrate Armed Forces Day in Malvern next year.
Malvern Town Council’s events co-ordinater Eadwine Brown has held discussions with the Red Devils Freefall Team about performing at next year’s Armed Forces Gala Day, which will take place on June 25.
The Red Devils is the official parachute display team of both The Parachute Regiment (The Paras) and the British Army and have appeared at the Malvern Spring Show.
The council is looking to make next year’s Armed Forces Day celebrations more extravagant than in recent years with a report to councillors stating celebrations in previous years have been ‘quite lacklustre’.
In fact, next year’s Armed Forces Gala day will be the first ever wholly run by town council staff.
The town council has provided grants to those running the Gala Day in 2013 and 2014 but there was no Armed Forces Gala Day this year, which prompted council bosses to do the day justice next year.
The Red Devils team have been operational since the 1960s and perform in dozens of shows throughout the country each year.
Every member of the team has served a minimum of three years in the Parachute Regiment Battalion and has taken part in at least one operational tour of duty in either the Falkland Islands, Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan or Iraq.
Recently the team had the privilege of walking out onto the pitch at Twickenham Stadium during England’s Rugby World Cup warm-up clash against Ireland.
And in June the 12-man team got to perform in front of Her Majesty The Queen when they landed onto the fields as part of the Epsom Derby.
Malvern town clerk Linda Blake said: “The town council is now more events focused and because of that we want to provide an Armed Forces Gala Day for everyone to enjoy. It will be the first one ever run by council staff.”
Mr Brown told the council’s events committee at a meeting on Thursday discussions had gone well and a provisional booking had been put in the diary.
He said: “The Red Devils have said they are available (on the date of the gala) and we have provisionally booked them.”
The event will also feature a civilian air display from local firm Rich Goodwin Airshows after the council’s events committee agreed to spend more than £1,400 for two aircraft.
