An 89-year-old war veteran who went missing from his retirement home in England was discovered on the shores of Normandy — celebrating the 70th anniversary of the D-Day invasion on Friday.
Bernard Jordan of Sussex left The Pines nursing home, wearing a gray coat and his war medals underneath, around 10:30 a.m. Thursday — and didn’t return, police sources told The Guardian.
Police searched the area, including bus stops and hospitals, but couldn’t find him on Thursday night.
But then the nursing home got a call from a younger war vet, who said he had met Jordan on a bus bound for France. The pair ended up sharing a hotel room not far from the site of the historic battle, the paper reported.
The adventurous old man had asked to go on an organized trip to tour the D-Day 70th anniversary events, but the nursing home couldn’t organize it — so he took matters into his own hands, the Telegraph UK reported.
“Staff at the home tried to get Mr. Jordan on to an accredited tour with the Royal British Legion, but due to the last minute nature of the request this was not possible,” Peter Curtis, CEO of Gracewell Healthcare, which owns the nursing home, told the paper.
“Mr. Jordan was reported missing to the police yesterday evening, as a matter of caution because he did not return form his normal trip to town, and when he left had not told us he was still intent on trying to get to Normandy. We can confirm that he attended the D-Day commemorations in Normandy today,” he said.
Jordan, who served with the Royal Navy during Operation Overlord, is a former mayor of the town of Hove.
His nursing home tweeted out a photo of Jordan, noting: “To mark the 70th anniversary of D-Day we wanted to share this incredible ‘then and now’ photo of Bernard #Hove #DDay”.