A SOLDIER who lost the use of his arm after an explosion in Afghanistan is to walk 154 miles from North Yorkshire to Chester to help raise funds for a memorial honouring his fallen comrades.
Corporal Mark Tonner, 29, will walk through Warrington on his trek, which started on Tuesday. He is expected in town at about 1pm today.
He will also have passed through Ripon, Harrogate, Skipton, Stockport, Runcorn and Helsby before finally arriving in Chester tomorrow (Friday)..
Mark was injured in 2010 while serving with 1st Battalion The Mercian Regiment (1 MERCIAN) in Helmand. It was a deployment which saw 12 soldiers from the unit killed.
As the Mercians prepare to deploy to Afghanistan again later this year, Mark felt now was the perfect time to show his continuing support.
He said: “The battalion has done a lot for me and so I wanted to help it raise money for a memorial. I would walk to the ends of the Earth if they asked me to.”
Mark joined the Cheshire Regiment, one of the parent regiments of the Mercians, in 2002 aged 17.
During his career he has served in Northern Ireland, Iraq, The Falkland Islands, Canada, Belize and Kenya, but it was his service in Afghanistan which saw him injured.
He explained: “We were on a normal patrol and, as we were crossing a tree line, a command wire device detonated. I was flung 10 or 15 feet and I felt like someone was pouring hot water down my right arm.”
He was evacuated by helicopter to the British Military Hospital at Camp Bastion, and from there home to the UK. The incident has left him with limited movement in his injured arm.
Mark will be supported by four other 1 MERCIAN soldiers during the walk. Each day he will carry two changes of clothes, six litres of water, food and other essentials weighing up to 20lbs – all of it in adapted kit that shifts its entire weight to the strongest side of his body.
He said: “At our camp in Catterick we have not yet got anything to remember our lads by, though we do have a memorial being built. I have chosen the towns that I’ll call into on the way to Chester because they have strong links with the battalion and because some of the lads that were killed were from these places.”
For more details on Mark’s walk in support of The Mercian Benevolent Fund and ABF: The Soldier’s Charity visit www.justgiving.com/mercianmarch22.
Pictured: Corporal Mark Tonner (second left) with some of the 1 MERCIAN support group who will assist during his 154 mile trek.
