EVERY time George Croston looks at his watch he thanks his lucky stars.

The former Fleet Air Arm navigator cheated death when he had to eject from one of the Navy's new Buccaneer aircraft while on a low-level exercise in 1969.

As he lay in intensive care with a broken back and jaw, an accident investigator found his cherished Rolex watch intact at the spot where he landed.

Mr Croston, now a parish councillor at Sherburn-in-Elmet, near Selby, still wears the watch to this day.

His narrow escape was one of the many stories recounted at a This Is Your Life evening, held at Eversley Park Community Centre, to mark his 60th birthday.

The surprise party enabled family and friends to share tales from his extraordinary life.

Mr Croston, of Hodgsons Lane, Sherburn-in-Elmet, was presented with his own commemorative red book as former colleagues and friends from around the country joined him in a nostalgic trip down Memory Lane".

A former Royal Marine, who was awarded the Green Beret, he joined the Fleet Air Arm as a corporal. He served in the Royal Navy for 23 years, rising to the rank of lieutenant, and worked with the SAS on a number of undercover missions.

His last military campaign was in the Falklands War, where he made front page headlines in the national newspapers when he was pictured escorting an Argentinian prisoner.

On his close brush with death after ejecting from the Buccaneer, near Inverness, 34 years ago, Mr Croston said: "I'm just glad the Rolex lived up to its name and survived.

"I wrote to Rolex and heard nothing until six months later when I was reprimanded by the Admiralty for disclosing secret information."

He left the Royal Navy in 1983 to read law at Cambridge and train as a barrister.

He then worked for the Crown Prosecution Service, advising them on a number of high profile disaster cases, including the Hillsborough tragedy.

Updated: 10:32 Thursday, March 06, 2003