Prince Harry breaks cover after 'peace summit' with solo trip following Diana's footsteps
The trip marks the first time he has been seen since peace talks with King Charles began, with senior aides for both the royals meeting in London, sparking rumours that a royal reconciliation could be on the horizon. While Harry has yet to address the meeting, he has made the surprise trip to Angola solo, just as Princess Diana did 28 years ago.
A source told the Daily Mail that the Duke of Sussex was taking the trip alone, after he decided it was too dangerous for Meghan Markle to join him. The source told the publication: 'The duke won't let his wife go to England over security concerns, so there was no chance he'd allow her to go to Angola to walk across landmines.'
Harry's solo trip saw him land at Luanda airport, in the capital city of Angola, where he took a series of photos with small two-person planes to the site of the mines he intends to walk across.
He is hoping the publicity surrounding his surprise visit will encourage more donations from the Angolan government, as a source said: 'Usually these trips help to drive a bit more money from the government.'
When Prince Harry came on board as a patron for Halo Trust in 2019, the Angolan government pledged £46million to create safe wildlife corridors and protect endangered species in conservation areas.
It set a target of clearing all landmines by 2025 and Harry is said to hope that his presence there will boost efforts to meet the target. Since 1994, Halo has cleared more than 123,000 landmines, and works to transform former war zones into farmland, national parks and 'safe' villages.
While on his trip to Africa, Harry is hoping to recreate the iconic images his mother, the late Princess Diana, created in 1997 when she took a walk through a minefield wearing a Halo Trust flak jacket and helmet.
The images of Diana, taken just months before she died, were copied by Harry during his walkthrough of Angola to continue his late mother's work in 2019.
Angola was ravaged by a brutal 27-year civil war that ended in 2002, but the country is still trying to uncover the millions of landmines buried across the countryside that still pose a threat to locals and wildlife.
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The victory party was thrown by the Mail at The Savoy. More than 300 guests attended. Winston Churchill, then secretary of state for war and air, gave Alcock and Brown their prize and announced that they would be knighted. But then tragedy struck. On December 18, 1919, Brown was killed in a crash while flying the all-new Vickers Viking amphibian to the Paris Airshow. The Daily Mail announced Alcock's death on December 20. The news report read: 'We deeply regret to announce the death of Sir John Alcock, D.F.C., winner of the Daily Mail £10,000 prize for the first transatlantic flight and the first airman to be knighted. 'His death followed a crash due to a heavy storm while flying a new machine to the Paris Exhibition.' The report added: 'Sir John Alcock breathed his last in an old four-poster bed of a small Normandy farmhouse at Cottevrard at 4pm yesterday. 'His fatal injuries were received when he crashed into a field three hours earlier while flying the new Vickers combination aeroplane and flying-boat to Paris for the Air Show.' Despite the loss, Alcock's exploits with Brown did achieve the recognition they deserved from fellow pilots. Charles Lindbergh reportedly gave the two men apt recognition when he landed in Paris after his solo crossing from New York in 1927. He allegedly said to rapturous onlookers: 'Why all this fuss? Alcock and Brown showed us the way.' Lindbergh's fellow aviator, Amelia Earhart, described Alcock and Brown's flight as 'an amazing feat, and the least appreciated'. She became the first woman to fly the Atlantic solo in 1932, before disappearing over the Pacific in 1937. And Amy Johnson, who flew from England to Australia in 1930, described Alcock and Brown's feat as 'the greatest in the history of aviation'.
