We were all on deck when we caught our first glimpse of the Scottish island. We all jumped for joy and kissed the ground after we disembarked in port at Sumburgh. We sincerely thanked the crew of the Vigra who, every month, risked their lives running arms to the Underground Resistance Movement in Norway, and who on this day had delivered six Canadian aircrew back to freedom.

In May 1966 Harvey Firestone and Maurice Neil returned to Norway to present a thank you scroll from the Minister of Veterans Affairs to all the citizens of Os who had helped in our escape. At the reception held for them in Os, Magnus Askvik, the schoolmaster who was our first contact, showed to the assembled gathering the compass from the Wellington as well as my air force flying cap which he had kept hidden for the last 22 years.

The story of their visit to Os was covered in the Bergen daily paper in part as follows - "After the dinner the Canadians and Shetland Larsen, Helen Nilsen, Kjell Harmens, Haldor Ovredal, Magnus Askvik and all the others who had taken part in the actions, sat and talked about old memories, or the event that was one of the most fantastic that took place in the Bergen area during the war".

In 1977 several of the above made a special trip to Canada sponsored by the R.C.A.F. Escaping Society and as part of their activities Rene and I had the pleasure and privilege of entertaining them one evening in our home.

In November 1990 a Remembrance Day story was published in the Huntsville Forester, written by a Norwegian Kai Pedersen, who was a resident of the Bergen area at the time. In part he wrote "As I am writing this and consulting the map of the area, I shudder at the thought of what happened that night and subsequent nights and days - many miracles took place, the first being that all six Canadians scrambled alive and unhurt out of the wreck - the pilot couldn’t have picked a more dangerous landing field if he had tried as the waters around the peninsula were crawling with German Naval ships while a few kilometres to the north-west was a large German army base.  Miracle number two must be that in the hamlet where the Wellington went down there normally was a German Army unit stationed, but the day before the crash the unit had been sent away and the replacement wouldn’t arrive before the following day.  Other miracles were the two trips by motor boat in broad daylight past the submarine base and the German fortress while dodging German patrol boats.  On these trips they were never stopped by the patrols.  If stopped it would have been the firing squad for all of them.  Even if one gives full credit to the planning, cunning and steel nerves of everybody involved it looks like both the rescuers and the rescued must have been born under some lucky stars."