A Biggin Hill ex-firefighter is rounding up a team of fellow former officers and Gurkhas to aid the relief effort in earthquake-hit Nepal.
Steve James is planning to travel to the Himalayan state with around 40 trained firefighters and eight Gurkhas to help restore water and electricity to stricken communities.
The 52-year-old, who has three fire engines of his own, assisted the humanitarian effort in New York following Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and after the deadly floods in Bosnia last year.
Mr James, of Village Green Way, who runs the UK branch of firefighters’ charity, Tunnel to Towers Run, helps to plan disaster-relief expeditions.
The retired London Fire Brigade firefighter of 30 years told News Shopper: “The difference with this expedition is we will be standing up beside the Gurkhas.
“They can help us to communicate.”
Steve James (right) and close friend Gurkha Hari Budha Magar gearing up for the relief effort
As part of his charity work, Mr James has got to know several Gurkhas by helping those who have been wounded in combat to travel to the US for Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy.
Mr James’s close friend and double amputee Hari Budha Magar, aged 35, who served in the Gurkhas for 15 years, will be accompanying the relief crew to Nepal.
Corporal Hari Budha Magar, who had his legs blown off by a bomb in Afghanistan in 2010, is a member of the British Limbless Ex-Servicemen’s Association and has family in Kathmandu.
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Hari Budha Magar, a double amputee from the Royal Gurkha Rifles
The team hope to fly out in an RAF C-17 aircraft packed with the three fire engines, two 4x4 trucks, supplies and stacks of teabags provided by Yorkshire Tea, this weekend.
“We have authorisation from the Nepalese embassy to go. We just need transport,” Mr James said.
“Once we’re there, we invite the communities to come and meet us.
“It’s amazing what a good cup of tea can do.
“The more we are in it together; the better it is going to be.”
Current and former firefighters from London, Blackpool, Doncaster, Humberside and Norfolk have volunteered for the expedition.
The 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck just before midday on Saturday sending tremors through Kathmandu Valley and nearby Pokhara city and claiming more than 5,000 lives.
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