18.12.2024

Roger Paul Thorington 1942 – 2024

We have received the sad news that UK access industry veteran Roger Thorington has died.

He passed away on the night of December 15th to 16th, having struggled with ill health for some time, he was 82. He leaves behind his wife Jane, daughter Delia and several grandchildren.

Roger Thorington was born on a farm in Rochford, Essex and went to school in Southend, leaving on his 15th birthday to join the British Army as an apprentice with the Royal Engineers. He spent the next three years in Harrogate, Yorkshire with spells at a technical college in Leeds.

He rose to become the most senior Non Commissioned Officer in the Royal Engineers equipment division. In the years that followed he oversaw the construction of a runway on the Isle of Sky in 1971, moving to Germany in 1974 for a similar project in Höxter, North Rhine-Westphalia. When the airfield was complete the local people wanted to present him and his relatively small team with an award, but it was not permitted at the time for serving personal to accept such things, but a thank-you memorial to the men was erected on the airfield instead, where it remains to this day.

Along the way he was offered a commission but apparently declined on the basis that commissioned officers tended to spend much of their time office bound, while he wanted to be organising things at the ‘coal face’.
In 1976 he was rewarded with an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honoursfor his exceptional leadership, dedication and hard work on the German airfield construction project, the largest that the Army had undertaken in years. See the original recommendation below.

Other projects involved spells in Canada, Hong Kong and back in the UK. He retired from the army on his 40th birthday in 1982, having served a full 25 years to the day.

That same year he joined PTP, the UK’s leading aerial lift rental company at the time, and remained with the company after it was acquired by BET in 1987, leaving in 1989 to join PTP colleague Mike Evans who was setting up GKN Powered Access. Thorington was appointed technical services manager, staying with the company until it was sold to A Plant (Ashtead) in mid-1995. His next move took him to platform manufacturer Simon Access, when it was sold a couple of years later he joined Grove Manlift as European service manager. In 2000 he spent a brief period with Phil Alan at Alan Access, leaving in 2001 to join Malcolm Bowers who recruited him as technical service director at AFI. He remained with the company until he retired in August 2007.

But his career did not quite end there, some three years later he was tempted back into the access industry by Malcolm Bowers to take up a consultancy role with Lifterz, the company Bowers had set up in 2007.

Speaking of his abilities former colleague Mike Evans said: “He was a first class organiser, led the quality assurance teams and always strove to deliver a best in class service delivery offering. Above all he was a totally dedicated person, honest, diligent, hardworking and a great team player, and we appreciated him for both his man management skills and great sense of humour.”

The funeral arrangements are as follows:
Friday 31st of January at 14:00
Huddersfield crematorium
Fixby Road
Huddersfield
West Yorkshire
HD2 2JF

For those unable to attend the funeral will also be livestreamed - details as follws:
Website: https://watch.obitus.com
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