Police are to investigate the death of an Army soldier during a ‘brutal’ training exercise, the Mail can reveal.
Witnesses said Private Nabin Thapa, 35, of the Royal Logistics Corps, collapsed and died following a series of exhausting marches and battle drills.
Colleagues of Thapa claim Army instructors added additional serials to the training programme which allegedly caused his death.
A probe into what happened at the Driffield Training Area in East Yorkshire on September 21 will be led by detectives from Humberside Police.
Thapa’s death came the day after another British soldier died on a separate exercise.
Private Adam Brocklehurst, from the Infantry Training Centre Support Battalion, died at Sennybridge in Wales on September 20.
Thapa, from Nepal, joined the British Army in March 2019.He was married and belonged to 6 Regiment RLC, based at Dishforth in North Yorkshire.
According to Army sources, his colleagues were furious about his death and accused their superiors of welfare failures.
Thapa was taking part in what soldiers called ‘CT Bravo’, a continuation training exercise.
A source said: ‘Thapa collapsed after the instructors decided to thrash everyone even though the exercises was supposed to be finished.
‘We all did extra attacks and firing drills. It was brutal. That’s why police are involved.’
The civilian police probe takes precedence over any inquiries by military police.
Between January 2000 and August 2022, 155 UK troops lost their lives on military exercises, of which 104 were soldiers.
In that time, the Ministry of Defence is understood to have breached Health and Safety Executive regulations at least 40 times.
