Chris Hunter (British Army officer)
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Major Chris Hunter QGM joined the British Army in 1989 as a sixteen-year-old army apprentice. He trained initially as a Russian linguist working in defence intelligence and after four years of enlisted service was selected to undergo officer training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. He graduated at twenty-one, was awarded the Carmen Sword of Honour and was commissioned into the Royal Logistic Corps (RLC)–the route that would eventually lead to his becoming an Ammunition Technical Officer (the British Army’s counter-terrorist bomb disposal operators).
He served as a troop commander on operations in the Balkans, East Africa and Northern Ireland and undertook arctic warfare training in Norway, before becoming an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) operator. As an operator he deployed on two high-threat tours in Northern Ireland and one in Iraq, undertook EOD protection duties for the Royal Family and assisted in the planning and conduct of numerous police arrest operations involving the threat of explosive devices. He was also the designated technical Operations Officer for the national contingency response to the terrorist use of a weapon of mass destruction in the UK. He was later involved with a number of specialist counter terrorism units and saw active service in Afghanistan, Colombia and Iraq as well as on counter-terrorism operations in the UK.
For his actions in Iraq he was awarded the Queen's Gallantry Medal. He retired from the MoD in January 2007 as the MoD’s senior IED intelligence analyst and has since become a writer, broadcaster and the director of a counter-IED consultancy company. Chris is also a Fellow of the Institute of Explosives Engineers, a Member of the International Association of Bomb Technicians and Investigators and a regular contributor to television and radio news and current affairs programmes. He is also a supporter of the charity BLESMA for which he trained to run a marathon while wearing a complete bomb disposal suit,[1] completing it in 6hrs 56mins[2] - setting a new world record.
[edit] Published work
Chris Hunter's first autobiography, Eight Lives Down, was published in October 2007. It covers the four-month period he served as a Bomb Disposal Operator in Iraq.[3] Its sequel, Extreme Risk[4] - released in May 2010 - charts the fascinating story of his journey into bomb disposal and the terrifying career he spent fighting the world’s deadliest bomb-makers.
Chris Hunter is the pseudonym of a real British Army EOD Major who wanted to remain anonymous for personal safety reasons.
