British paratroopers were met by French customs officials as they landed in Normandy for the 80th anniversary of D-Day.
Footage shows the troops landing in a French field carrying their heavy bags, only to be forced to show their passports and documents to waiting officers.
Swarms of other paras can be seen landing after jumping out of a plane to commemorate the Normandy landings while a queue forms in front of French customs officials.
It is a markedly different reception to that received by their forebears, who dropped into northern France ahead of the D-Day landings on June 6, 1944.
Some 320 British, Belgian and US paratroopers took part in the jump, descending into a historic D-Day drop zone to recreate the events of 1944.
The 250 British paratroopers took off from RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before jumping into the drop zone near Sannerville to commemorate the airborne invasion 80 years ago.
Some 30 US and 40 Belgian troops also took part in the jump, although US troops were not checked as they were already in France.
At 1pm, the paratroopers launched themselves out of an Airbus A400M, touching down roughly eight minutes later in fields near Sannerville – designated drop zone K on June 6 1944.
The British Army’s 16 Air Assault Brigade sent 250 paratroopers to the event, among whom was Sergeant Danny Mawson who wore a smock worn by D-Day paratrooper Colour Sergeant Tommy Alderson.
The 8th Battalion Parachute Regiment had jumped behind enemy lines into fields just west of Sannerville in the early hours of June 6, 1944.
Eighty years later, the paratroopers had a much warmer welcome. The Royal British Legion Band of Wales, from Llanelli, played Vera Lynn’s We’ll Meet Again as the drop began, with parachutists filling the air.
The wind caused some to drop right over the seated dignitaries and one had to shout at the watching crowds as he came down among them.
After landing and gathering up their parachutes, they made their way to a border point set up in the corner of a farmers field to show their passports.
Brigadier Mark Berry, the paras commander, told the Sun: ‘It is something we haven’t experienced before.
‘But given the Royal welcome we have had from every other feature, it seems like a very small price to pay for coming to France.’
Brigadier Berry paid tribute to the 23,000 airborne troops from Britain, America, the Commonwealth and Canada who parachuted in behind enemy lines in the early hours of June 6, 1944, as part of Operation Tonga.
They landed after midnight, just hours before the beach landings started, with orders to destroy a gun battery and secure control of four key bridges, two which they captured and two they destroyed.
A fifth of the troops in Operation Tonga were wounded and 821 lost their lives that day.