A special 101st birthday surprise for Normandy veteran Hector Duff was arranged yesterday (Thursday) by the Manx Aviation and Military Museum.

One of its members arrived outside Hector’s house in Onchan in a 1942 Daimler ’Dingo’ armoured car, the exact type Hector drove in North Africa.

Michael Haynes of Ballaragh had painted it in the markings of the 7th Armoured Division, the Desert Rat, in which Hector served from 1941 to the end of the war.

Hector told onlookers some tales of his time in the desert in Dingos, and in a larger type of armoured car after the Normandy invasion.

He expressed a wish to return to France one final time to visit the new British Normandy Memorial, which is due to open next year.