Chinook Crew 'Chick': Highs and Lows of Forces Life from the Longest Serving Female RAF Chinook Force Crewmember

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I think if you want that extra ‘ohh, isn’t she amazing? Look, she’s the girl doing this job,’ you’re almost saying that they’re not capable of it in the first place.’ Yes, I have,” she said. “Having had the book come out [all her mental health challenges are] now completely out in the world. And the more I’m talking about it, the more it is genuinely OK now. This, it seems, saved her life. McConaghy started receiving counselling for PTSD from the charity Help For Heroes, and “cried for months, finally letting go of all the tears I had stored up inside me over the years that I had never let leak out from my eyes for fear of displaying weakness”.

These weapons of mass destruction gave us the ability to protect the Chinook from all directions, sometimes without needing to fire a bullet, the sight of them being enough of a deterrent to the enemy,” recalls McConaghy.AeroTime caught up with Liz earlier this week and also appointed her as the latest AeroTime Aviation Champion in recognition of her work and dedication to the industry. Congratulations to Liz! We’re all really bad at saying: ‘I’m living the dream, things are great’. And, whenever you do get asked that question, give your mental health a number. Are you a six, a five or maybe a seven today? There are two reasons for that. Firstly, it helps you gauge where you are, so you’ll notice changes or not. If you’ve been at number three for a few weeks that’s not good. But if you can get everyone to use that system, it’s also a good measure for other people and help them notice how you’re doing.” On board one of the Chinooks, Liz McConaghy – a feisty 25-year-old blonde from County Down, Northern Ireland – watched the changing landscape skidding below and concentrated on the operation to come.

Just like anything in our body that breaks, with time, rest and the right people to help you recover, we can mend our broken brains. I’ve closed the door on that dark tunnel and am walking a new, more positive path.” Aged 21, Liz was the youngest member of the aircrew to deploy to Iraq and the only female crew member on the Chinook wing for four years, so her story is entirely unique.Liz is a brilliant natural storyteller. With many laugh out loud moments but she equally pulls no punches about the dark side of war and it’s effects" Upon leaving the RAF in 2019, Liz slowly unravelled after a series of traumatic events compounding her PTSD. This led to her trying to end her life in Aug 2020. I wrote the book when I was going through my PTSD counselling, and it took me 3 weeks to write because I just had to brain dump everything and it [was] just stored on my laptop and I never thought about it. Then a friend of mine and I were out walking and I mentioned it and she was like you’ve got to send this off to a publisher, what happens if somebody wants to publish it? Then it got published. It was never written in any way to be read by anyone, never mind the whole world, but seemingly everyone has really enjoyed it. McConaghy said that the most frequently asked, and least favorite, question over the years has been the challenges she has faced as a female crewman.