A British bomb disposal expert killed in Afghanistan revealed the horrors of his final months in a series of letters to his wife. Staff Sergeant Olaf 'Oz' Schmid described staying alive as a 'lottery' and wrote of the horrific injuries sustained by colleagues. In a phone call two days before his death he told his wife Christina of his tiredness and desperation to come home. He died on October 31 on his last day in the field, a week before he had been due to fly home. Hailed a hero, he had made safe 64 explosive devices during his five months in Afghanistan but was killed when the 65th exploded. Staff Sgt Olaf Schmid revealed the horrors of his final months in Afghanistan in letters to his wife Christina Extracts from the series of letters, published by The Guardian newspaper in an interview with Mrs Schmid, show the gradual deterioration of 30-year-old Staff Sgt Schmid's morale. In one, sent around halfway through his six month tour of duty, he thanked his wife for moving house without him and for her support. He wrote: 'All you do and have done since I met you and since we've been here has been fantastic...thank you for being you. I have everything you sent me and it's sitting in my body armour and day sack, so you are always watching over me and with me. I feel your energy around me...' He wrote of his hopes for their five-year-old son Laird's future and his ambition to move one day from their home in Winchester to Cornwall, where he had grown up in Truro. Extracts from another letter revealed his growing concern at the situation in Afghanistan. In it he told his wife how he had a picture of her to watch over him and considered himself lucky to be able to look at the same moon as her at night. He wrote: 'I am pushing to come back bang on six months, no one in this job should do more, as we keep getting reminded. Staying alive is like a lottery, patrolling the Afghan badlands is playing Russian roulette with your feet. Dealing with bombs is easy, it's the getting shot at whilst doing a job that tends to make me run...' Christina Schmid has been praised for her courage in applauding the coffin of her husband Staff Sgt Olaf Schmid as it was driven through Wootton Bassett, in Wiltshire, on November 5 By the time of the last letter the tone of the soldier, described be friends and colleagues as "effervescent", had become pessimistic. He shared details of some of the horrific injuries suffered by his colleagues. Staff Sgt Schmid wrote: 'One bloke lost his hearing...and X lost both his legs above the knees and one arm and half his genitals. He's staying strong though...I've been talking to him, keeping him strong...morale has been hit...however with the news that Y got his hearing back when he woke up we're all feeling a bit better tonight...I'm keeping a right open mind about all of this honey, and I just can't wait to crack on...' In the interview his wife, who described her husband as a warrior and a 'preserver of life', spoke of his final phone call home. Mrs Schmid said he had sounded exhausted. She said he had told her: ' I need you to come and get me. I've only had a couple of hours sleep in four days. I'm so weary and homesick and I just want you, I need you. It's just too much now, too much now, too long for me.' Mrs Schmid has been praised for her courage after she applauded her husband's coffin as it was paraded through Wootton Bassett, in Wiltshire, when it was repatriated. She said her husband had always been someone who wanted to 'crack on' and who had an aptitude for hard work and 'fiddly things' which made him well-suited to bomb disposal. She refused to blame financial shortfalls in the military for her husband's death. She said: 'They keep talking about money, but no amount of money is going to make these characters, these strong men appear. Britain doesn't make these men any more. 'I feel that him and the others are there to protect us, they are not part of a political machine, they are warriors for our country. All I ask is that every politician and every civil servant works just as hard as Oz and I did to'Staying alive is like a lottery': Haunting last letters of bomb disposal hero blown up in Afghanistan
Last updated at 4:55 PM on 14th November 2009
Saturday, 14 November 2009
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