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February 20, 2009
Drunk British Soldier Takes Tracked Vehicle on Joyride Through Germany
.jpg "British FV107 Scimitar Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle")
A British soldier stationed in Germany got all tanked up and took a tank for a spin. The two vehicles he managed to commandeer, crash, and abandon were British FV107 Scimitar Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicles, so they were "light tanks" - tracked and lightly armored, but not main battle tanks, per se. And the photo above, also shown in the article linked below, has nothing to do with the joyride in question. It's a stock file photo they pilfered off the internet without giving credit.
http://www.thelocal.de/national/20090220-17565.html
A drunk British soldier stole two small tanks from his northern German base for a joyride towards the town of Bergen at 4 am on Friday morning, a British Army spokesperson told The Local.
"He had a blood alcohol content of 1 promille - past the legal driving limit in Germany - and decided he'd like to take one of the vehicles out of camp," British Army spokesperson Helga Heine said. "At some point he wrecked the tank, got out, went back and got another one and drove it in the same direction, hitting a tree before he was stopped."
German police in the state of Lower Saxony reported that the 18-year-old Camp Hohne soldier stole two tanks, but Heine said they were actually Scimitars, which are armoured reconnaissance vehicles often called light tanks.
Just before the soldier reached the Bergen city limit, British military police stopped him as he almost rammed an oncoming car, police said. The soldier then ran a patrol car off the road and lost control of the tank, hitting a guide post before being halted by a 75-centimetre-thick tree, police reported.
Military police arrested the soldier and are being assisted in their investigation by German police.
"We all got the giggles when we read this," Heine told The Local. "But stealing a vehicle is a serious offense it will be dealt with accordingly."
Camp Hohne is home to some 2,000 British soldiers and the headquarters of the 7th Armoured Brigade.
Posted by Rob Kiser on February 20, 2009 at 9:40 AM
Comments
They were NOT scimitars!!! They were a spartan, and a samaritan which is an armoured ambulance. Trust me. I have an EXTREMELY reliable source.
Posted by: mikey magee on February 8, 2010 at 2:16 AM
Is this a confession?
Posted by: Rob Kiser 
on February 8, 2010 at 7:07 PM