A 16-year-old from Aberdeenshire has become the youngest girl to be accepted by the Army for bomb disposal training.

Andrea Milne, from Portlethen, was inspired to sign up by the tragic death of Staff Sergeant Olaf Schmid, who was killed last month in Afghanistan while attempting to defuse an improvised explosive device (IED).

The teenager, who has worked as a sales assistant in a high-street clothing store since leaving school in August, hopes to be disarming bombs in Afghanistan within two years.

Andrea has told the Army that she wants to specialise as an ammunition technician and will begin a 42-week training course in March at the Army Foundation College in Harrogate, North Yorkshire.

After completing the course, which is designed for 16 and 17-year-old school-leavers, Milne will specialise in her chosen career. Her training will include looking after ammunition and making safe unexploded grenades and anti-tank shells during live training exercises.

She will also learn how to identify, disarm and dispose of a variety of munitions and explosive devices. An army spokesman said she could attain the rank of full corporal within two years.

Andrea said she was inspired by the heroism of Schmid, 30, of the Royal Logistics Corps, who died in Helmand after making safe 64 bombs during his five months in Afghanistan.

Schmid, who was nicknamed Oz, had been due to return home the day after he was killed for two weeks’ holiday with his wife and five-year-old stepson Laird before returning to Afghanistan. Despite the risks, Andrea, who has the support of her family, said she was determined to become a bomb disposal expert.

“There are two things you can be certain of; that you will die and that you will not know when or where,” she said. “What really appeals to me is helping other people and potentially saving lives, combined with the travelling and the excitement. I don’t want to be stuck in an office. I want to do something where I use my brain and I was looking at engineering when I found out about ammunition technicians. It’s an incredibly varied job, from breaking down rifle clips to defusing IEDs. I’m not scared — you are told about the risks.”

Her father, Gary, 44, said: “There’s always the worry that something could happen to Andrea and, of course, there was the recent tragic death of Olaf Schmid, but this is what she wants so she has our full support.”

The growing use of IEDs, typically fashioned from artillery shells and trigger devices, has become a great threat to coalition troops in Afghanistan.

A spokesman for the Army said: “It is quite rare for a girl of Andrea’s age to want to go into bomb disposal, but she is very committed.”

Times Recommends

• The chilling lie behind two webcam suicides
• Crochet and crafts at the hen party
• Want to be a genius? Practise, says geneticist