Another man, divorced and at loose ends, offered to take his skills as a bomb-disposal expert to Vietnam to sweep for unexploded ordnance.
As bomb-disposal experts, they are in the business of saving people's lives, but they do it with enough juiced-up aggression that there's no risk of sentimentality.
The bomb's timer was running and it would have gone off on 29 July 1985 if a bomb-disposal expert had not disabled it.
In late 2004, Armenia deployed a unit of 46 soldiers, which included bomb-disposal experts, doctors, and transport specialists, to Iraq as part of the American-led Multi-National Force Iraq.
The man speaking was Christian Gabardos, the serene 38-year-old chief of a squad of 12 demineurs, as France's 120 professional bomb-disposal experts are known.
Tommy and Catherine approached with the cautious reverence of bomb-disposal experts moving in on a suspect device.
The bomb was hidden in an encyclopedia and it killed a bomb-disposal expert, injuring two others.
A bomb-disposal expert, Orlando Ramilo, handed the defense a prime opportunity to convince the jury.
Initially, the George Cross was designed solely for civilians, but it has been awarded many times to the Armed Forces - in particular to bomb-disposal experts.
Those who know in advance - such as bomb-disposal experts - that their chances of survival are slim yet, time and again, go into these dangerous situations.