This has likely been posted elsewhere and is old news by now, but I was listening to the radio last night and they announced that Bruce was flying to Cyprus to help take the British citizens evacuated from Lebanon back home.
From the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation:
SC & MUSIC: MAIDEN VOYAGE Duration: 00:03:53
You've made it through the endless queues and chaos in Lebanon. You've made a traumatic twelve-hour journey aboard a jam-packed ship, surrounded by military personnel handing out corned-beef hash, and green-faced people disgorging that corned-beer hash. Then you yourself were disgorged in Cyprus, where you milled about blinking with hordes of other anxious, displaced people. Having experienced all this turmoil, what are you to make of the news that you will be airlifted home by the lead singer of Iron Maiden?
Your first impression would likely be that you had consumed tainted corned-beef hash. But for two-hundred British citizens yesterday, this surreal heavy-metal deus ex machina was real. Bruce Dickinson, who has been the head shrieker for Iron Maiden, on and off, for nearly twenty-five years, flew a Boeing 757 to Cyprus to help out his fellow Britons. Mr. Dickinson is something of a tight-panted Renaissance man: besides being an impressive rock howler, he is a published author, an expert fencer, and an enthusiastic wearer of entirely leather outfits.
And, of course, he's also a flyer of planes. This wasn't some situation where the rock star sits next to the pilot chugging Jack Daniels and then slurringly takes all the credit. Mr. Dickinson is a trained pilot, and has worked for a charter airline.
Even armed with this knowledge, it must have been a peculiar experience to hear "Ladies and gentleman this is your captain speaking," from the man who once wailed about "the number of the beast" and it being "two minutes to midnight". Peculiar -- but an enormous relief. So doff your hats to Bruce Dickinson, high-flown hard-rock hero. Then, return your trays to the upright position, and fasten your seatbelts. Here he is in his day job: this is Iron Maiden, with "Run To The Hills".
From the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation:
SC & MUSIC: MAIDEN VOYAGE Duration: 00:03:53
You've made it through the endless queues and chaos in Lebanon. You've made a traumatic twelve-hour journey aboard a jam-packed ship, surrounded by military personnel handing out corned-beef hash, and green-faced people disgorging that corned-beer hash. Then you yourself were disgorged in Cyprus, where you milled about blinking with hordes of other anxious, displaced people. Having experienced all this turmoil, what are you to make of the news that you will be airlifted home by the lead singer of Iron Maiden?
Your first impression would likely be that you had consumed tainted corned-beef hash. But for two-hundred British citizens yesterday, this surreal heavy-metal deus ex machina was real. Bruce Dickinson, who has been the head shrieker for Iron Maiden, on and off, for nearly twenty-five years, flew a Boeing 757 to Cyprus to help out his fellow Britons. Mr. Dickinson is something of a tight-panted Renaissance man: besides being an impressive rock howler, he is a published author, an expert fencer, and an enthusiastic wearer of entirely leather outfits.
And, of course, he's also a flyer of planes. This wasn't some situation where the rock star sits next to the pilot chugging Jack Daniels and then slurringly takes all the credit. Mr. Dickinson is a trained pilot, and has worked for a charter airline.
Even armed with this knowledge, it must have been a peculiar experience to hear "Ladies and gentleman this is your captain speaking," from the man who once wailed about "the number of the beast" and it being "two minutes to midnight". Peculiar -- but an enormous relief. So doff your hats to Bruce Dickinson, high-flown hard-rock hero. Then, return your trays to the upright position, and fasten your seatbelts. Here he is in his day job: this is Iron Maiden, with "Run To The Hills".
