An Cosantóir

18 INTERVIEW WITH RAY GOGGINS INTERVIEW WITH RAY GOGGINS By Cpl Lee Coyle Ray is an ex-member of the Defence Forces (DF) and served as part of the Army Ranger Wing for the majority of his career. This interview gives us an insight into Ray's career and what he is doing now that he has retired from the DF. Q. Ray, can you give me a brief description of your career? I joined the Defence Forces in 1990 and was stationed in Cork. I served 9 years there in the 4th Inf Battalion. I attempted "selection" first in 1992 but failed, I went back in 1999 and passed. I was much more prepared 7 years later. I had a great career, I was an NCO in Cork, a young Cor- poral and I served 4 trips overseas, so I had a lot of experience. I just wanted to try out the Ranger Wing. It opened different doors. I am a die-hard infantry person, whether that's regular infantry platoon or Special Forces, it's the same process. You just concentrate on the specifics more in Special Forces and that attention to detail that we talk about in the Infantry is just done religiously in Special Forces; that's the only difference for me. I did 17 years in Special Forces, so I was lucky enough that when I got into the Ranger Wing, we deployed straight to East Timor. I also deployed to Africa and The Balkans. I got to experience a lot of cross training with different units, with the British, the Americans, the French and the Germans. They were great opportunities. I did a deployment with SOCOM in Tampa Bay, Florida with the Navy Seals and Marine Special Forces. We were all the same. They just had more money. Q. Was there good comradery between you? Yeah, absolutely, there was. Even when I went into the private sector in Afghanistan, I was working with ex British military, French, Germans, Americans. It's the same thing, you are all working together. Some of the drills that we bring from our Irish background are better than theirs. Q. After the DF, how did you move into television and going onto the show? TV kind of came like a blindside. It wasn't my plan; I wasn't leaving the army thinking I was going to be a film star. That wasn't the idea. There was an old colleague of mine, a former officer I worked with, who rang me… he had got the call from RTÉ and the Army were on board for it also. They said "look, would you be interested in getting involved in the show" I originally said, "no. not a hope". I didn't want it to be out in the open, after being in the 'Ranger Wing' for 17 years. Reconnaissance is my background, crawling around, saying nothing, and surveillance... you would want to be going around saying nothing. So, I thought about it then, and when I realised who else was on the team, we kind of tried it out and yeah look, we made a step into it. I was nervous, we weren't sure what was going to happen, but we wanted it to be very close to what we did for real, in Ranger Wing selection, so we kept it as close to that and we set the pa- rameters. The TV company wanted Hollywood, but we wanted reality. Did we meet in the middle? No, it was more our side. Q. Where you surprised as to how successful it was? Absolutely, yeah. I thought that Army lads would watch it, the Guards, the Fire brigade, and a couple of GAA teams, rugby teams, but it's amazing the type of people that it hits. People that don't know what it is, think its these 4 gorillas, just torturing people for the week. It is that too, I suppose, a little bit. Like, smart people see it's about people understanding who they are, as in the students. The more you know about yourself, the better your chance of getting through selection. The more you know when you are weak or when you struggle or need help, they are the people that get through. It's Ray Abseiling for Charity A man's best Friend, keeping Ray Company

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