Burnley soldier serving in Afghanistan sends ‘Happy First Birthday’ message to his son

Engineer Dominic Hindle (26), from Burnley, who is a member of 36 Engineer Regiment, and his comrades made “happy birthday” signs for little Harvey Hindle who will celebrate his first birthday on April 28th.

Dominic, who attended Rosegrove Infants, Lowerhouse Juniors and Habergham High School, joined the Army in September 2009 after working for Pendle Council for a number of years.

He joined the Royal Engineers as a plant operator and completed 14 weeks’ basic training at ATR Bassingbourn where he came top recruit.

Dominic then went onto combat engineer training and finally six months of plant operator training where again he was top student.

He was deployed to the Nad-e-ali district of Afghanistan where his job is to search compounds or routes searching for and clearance of improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

His tour finishes at the end of August, meaning he will miss the birthday party organised by Harvey’s mum and Dominic’s girlfriend Danielle McKillop, of Norton Street, Hapton.

He said: “I’m devastated to be missing my son’s first birthday and hope my little man is proud of his daddy. I am missing Harvey and Danielle loads and I can’t wait to be home. His mum is organising a little party and sending me pictures of that.”