Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson recalls flying RAF pilots home from Afghanistan: ‘It was very emotional’

‘We were both trying not to [cry],’ singer said

Iron Maiden’s frontman Bruce Dickinson has recalled a past experience where he flew Royal Air Force (RAF) pilots home from Afghanistan in 2008.

During an appearance at the Uptown Theater in Kansas City as part of Dickinson’s ongoing tour An Evening with Bruce Dickinson, a member of the audience asked the 63-year-old rocker about his most memorable flight with British soldiers.

The English singer, who is a qualified commercial pilot, responded by mentioning his 2008 flight from Afghanistan.

“We were the flying the Royal Air Force Regiment, which is RAF boots-on-the-ground soldiers, and they’d been to Afghanistan,” he said.

“They had taken some casualties and they had lost some people, but they were all really cheerful – the best passengers you could ever have in the military,” Dickinson added. “As we were coming into land, we stopped and we blew the reverse thrust.

“We were looking out, and all really close to the runway were families, kids, all the families and wives and everybody of all the soldiers, and they were all [holding signs, saying] ‘You’re my hero, daddy’ and everything else.”

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The Senjutsu artist described his overall experience as extremely “emotional”.

“We were both trying not to [cry]. I went, ‘Okay, we’re gonna stop. We’re gonna blow our noses, make sure we can see where we’re going, and then do the job – because this is really exceptional,’” Dickinson said.

The singer, who owns the aviation company Caerdav, is currently on a spoken-word tour around the US.

An Evening with Bruce Dickinson sees him speak about his life, his career as a rock star, and a host of other topics, including his 2014 throat cancer diagnosis and treatment.