''Sir Barry Michael Thornton is a British retired officer who was a senior commander in the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

Personal life

Thornton was educated at Baines Grammar School and the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public research university in Nottingham, England. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. Nottingham's main campus (University Park Campus, Nottingh ...

. He is married to Delia Thornton, a trained midwife and family law barrister. The couple has two sons, Oliver and William.

Military career

Thornton joined the

in 1976.Air Marshal Barry Thornton CB RAF
Ministry of Defence He was given command of the Engineering and Supply Wing at RAF Honington in 1988 and subsequently deployed to Tabuk Air Base during the

Gulf War , combatant2 = , commander1 = , commander2 = , strength1 = Over 950,000 soldiers3,113 tanks1,800 aircraft2,200 artillery systems , page = https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-PEMD-96- ...

. In 1991 he took command of the RAF's

nuclear weapon A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission or atomic bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear weapon), producing a nuclear exp ...

inspection team. Then in 1997 he joined the

Defence Procurement Agency The Defence Procurement Agency (DPA), was an Executive Agency of the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence responsible for the acquisition of materiel, equipment and services, for the British armed forces. Led by the Chief of Defence Procurement ...

as the Director of Maritime Projects with responsibility for the

Merlin The Multi-Element Radio Linked Interferometer Network (MERLIN) is an interferometer array of radio telescopes spread across England. The array is run from Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire by the University of Manchester on behalf of UK Re ...

and

Nimrod Nimrod is a Hebrew Bible, biblical figure mentioned in the Book of Genesis and Books of Chronicles, the Books of Chronicles. The son of Cush (Bible), Cush and therefore the great-grandson of Noah, Nimrod was described as a king in the land of Sh ...

programmes. In 2000 he became Controller of Aircraft on the Air Force Board and in 2003 he was made Director General Equipment Support (Air) and then Director General Logistics (Strike) at the Defence Logistics Organisation. He became the last Commander in Chief Personnel and Training Command in January 2006 serving until April 2007 when the command was merged into Air Command: he then took up the post of Chief of Defence Material (Air) at Defence Equipment & Support. He retired in May 2009.Ministry of Defence website

References

, - , - , - Year of birth missing (living people) Royal Air Force air marshals Fellows of the Royal Aeronautical Society Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Living people Alumni of the University of Nottingham {{RAF-bio-stub