A YOUNG soldier from Huddersfield is proving a saviour.

Sapper Tom Sykes, 21, a bomb disposal searcher from Huddersfield, is clearing munitions from land in Kenya.

Sapper Sykes has been deployed on the Army’s Exercise Pine Apple clearing unexploded ordinance (UXO) and small arms casings from the area around Archers Post in central Kenya.

The austere area has been heavily used by both the British and the Kenyan army for Infantry training.

But they left behind potentially deadly mortars, projectiles, grenades and legacy munitions that failed to detonate.

If left, the unexploded weapons could pose a risk to nomadic tribes.

The British Army has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Kenyan authorities, undertaking to clear all of the areas along with the Kenyan Army.

The Sappers also have a vital information role, visiting local schools and villages within a 70km radius to educate them on the inherent dangers of handling the munitions.

Their efforts have helped bring about a significant decline in injuries.

Tom is one of a 20-man team known as a baseline, of which there are three.

It means he faces long hours in the heat, walking the ranges in a search pattern under the blistering Kenyan sun.

It’s a hard job lasting for four weeks and starting at 6.30am.

An Army spokesman said: "However uncomfortable the process though, the exercise does produce tangible results.

"The teams cleared 89 UXO’s within the first two weeks and nearly 2,000 items of scrap from spent munitions.

"Just one 105mm high explosive projectile, the most common shell used by the British Army at the moment, is powerful enough to blow a two metre wide by half a metre deep crater".

Tom, whose parents Lisa and Gordon live in Huddersfield, said: "The exercise is going really well and my baseline found a lot of UXO’s at the start.

"It just depends which features were used the most during the Infantry exercises."

Tom, a former Almondbury High School student, also runs the camp bar.

"It’s really important to the locals though as with less dangers there will hopefully be less injuries.

"In my role as the barman I am also learning a bit of the local language from the guys who work in the stores I get supplies from, so am getting better rates to stock our bar.

"It’s just little essentials like phone cards, fizzy drinks, cordial and cigarettes and lighters, but it’s good to be able to interact with the Kenyan Army guys who run the stores."

Tom joined the Army in 2006.