Hero soldier lacked equipment to detect Taliban bomb booby trap

A bomb disposal hero did not have equipment to detect a new Taliban device which killed him in Afghanistan, an inquest heard yesterday.

Staff Sergeant Olaf Schmid was posthumously awarded the George Cross for disarming 64 improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in five months.

But on the last day before he was due to fly home, S/Sgt Schmid died after his knee came into contact with a pressure plate recently developed by the Taliban as he disarmed his third set of explosives that day.

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The 30-year-old was hailed as “phenomenally great” and “a giant of a man” as his inquest in Truro came to a close.

Colonel Bob Seddon, Britain’s top bomb disposal officer who resigned last year, said it was a “constant battle” to keep up with new devices that were developed by the Taliban.

“With the equipment capability that Olaf had at the time, he would not have had the ability to detect a low metal content pressure plate,” Col Seddon told the hearing.

Coroner Dr Emma Carlyon had heard S/Sgt Schmid had been “impatient” and “not his usual jovial self” on October 31 2009 but giving a narrative verdict at Truro Coroner’s Court, she recorded: “There was nothing in the operation which fell below what might have been expected and that could have contributed to his death.”

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Widow Christina was absent from yesterday’s hearing after walking out midway through Wednesday’s session which heard her husband had been stressed after a conversation with his five-year-old stepson Laird the night before, who had told him: “Daddy, time to come home.”.

In a statement she said it was a deeply unsettling process “for myself, our families, friends and, of course, those members of his team. I will take the next few days to consider its findings in full.”

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