A Tiny Kitten Who Hid In the Bumper of a Pilot’s BMW Accidentally Becomes a Royal Navy Mascot

In June 2016, a tiny kitten went to sleep in a nice, warm safe place that turned out to be the bumper of a beloved BMW auto belonging to Royal Navy helicopter pilot Lieutenant Nick Grimmer of the 814 Naval Air Squadron. Grimmer had driven the car over 300 miles to his assignment before he discovered the little feline hitchhiker.

I’d landed at Birmingham after a holiday and travelled via Bristol and Bath before arriving in Cornwall quite late… I looked in the boot, under the bonnet and climbed all over and under it and still couldn’t find what was making the noise. I called up some of our air engineers who came and helped me to start dismantling my pride and joy. On taking off the rear bumper we were greeted by a tiny tiger-striped kitten.

The cat was immediately adopted as a mascot by the squad and named Tigger in honor of their own “Flying Tigers” nickname. While Tigger was welcomed aboard, the squad did their best to find Tigger’s human with “Operation Tiger Kitten” as ordered by Commander Brendan Spoors.

We are more than happy to adopt ‘Tigger’ as a mascot; after all it’s a tradition for Royal Naval units to have a ships cat! Tigger must have an owner somewhere between here and Birmingham and we are keen to locate them. I instructed my team to launch ‘Operation Tiger Kitten’.

It’s unclear as to the resolution of this mission, but Tiggy is sure to be somewhere safe.