It is very hard to imagine what would have been going through a solider's mind on the approach to France on June 5 1944.
Tomorrow marks exactly 70-years since D-Day, when British and ally soldiers landed on the beaches of Normandy and began their attack on the German army during World War II.
156,000 ally troops stormed the beaches on June 6 1944, supported by almost 200,000 Naval personnel.
The weather was far from ideal as thousands of soldiers crossed the Channel and Maurice Cross, who now lives in Keynsham, was onboard HMS Seagull with the British Navy on its way to Normandy alongside the army.
"We and other flotillas, mine swept the Invasion Force across to Normandy. Looking ahead from the bridge across an empty sea to the enemy-held coast, with all our invasion craft behind us, I felt immensely vulnerable," said Mr Cross.
"Just imagine being a soldier crouched behind the landing-craft flap, hearing the bullets and shrapnel zinging off that flap and knowing when it crashes down, your chances of making it to the top of the beach are about 50 per cent.
"I was a little more glad to be in the navy," he said.
The Naval fleet was made up of eight different navies with 6939 vessels involved.
Three years earlier, a young Mr Cross, now 91, was living in Bristol but wanted to be a part of the war effort.
"I was fed up with cowering in a shelter with all the air raids," he said.
After putting his age forward a few months, Mr Cross joined the Royal Navy Signal School in Devonport, Plymouth and became a Bridge Signalman.
Bridge Signalmen carried out watches on signal bridges and sent and received messages by flashing light, semaphore and flights. The Royal Navy phased out the signalman ranking in 2004.
After his involvement in visual communications during World War II, Mr Cross left the armed forces in 1946 and began working with his father in Bath, before working at electrical company SWEB in Bristol, which is now part of Western Power Distribution.
Commemorations will take place around the world tomorrow and Mr Cross intends to remember the day from the comfort of his home.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
