Mike Kealy

Mike Kealy was the 27-year old Captain at the Battle of Mirbat in 1972. After the battle he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.

Death
He died of hypothermia in February 1979 on a training exercise in the Brecon Beacons in deteriorating weather conditions. He was found alive (but in poor condition) by a two-man search party—one of whom stayed with him and attempted to keep him warm. It was later acknowledged by the Coroner that one of the major contributory factors in his death was the delay in retrieving him from the hillside—a delay of some 19 hours due to inclement weather. Another factor was that Kealy had not packed cold weather gear, instead carrying bricks in his Bergen pack to up its weight to 50 pounds. When offered warm clothing by the search party, he refused - and even threw a warm blanket away. A combination of Kealy's bloody-minded stubbornness and the effects of hypothermia clouding his judgement seems to have been the tipping point.

As a direct result of this and similar incidents SAS personnel are now only allowed to carry useful items on training exercises.

Conspiracy
Sir Ranulph Fiennes alleged in his book The Feather Men that Mike Kealy was murdered by a group of contract killers called "The Clinic" in revenge for his role in the killing of Sheik's son. Fiennes suggests that Major Kealy's death was a result of a diabetic shock induced by the killers injecting him with insulin before the exercise. However, the circumstances of Mike Kealy's death suggest that this is somewhat fanciful. Kealy was seen by other service personnel undergoing the same SAS endurance exercise only a few hours beforehand.