Wellington, Feb 9 NZPA - Wing Commander Henry William Lamond, a New Zealander who was involved in two notable escapes from Geman prisoner of war camps, has died in England, aged 94.

Wg Cdr Lamond switched from the Royal New Zealand Air Force to Britain's Royal Air Force at the start of World War 2, and later, while a prisoner of war, developed a reputation as an inveterate tunneller in escape bids, the Telegraph newspaper in Britain reported.

Born on August 26, 1915 at Kaukapakapa, he went to Auckland Grammar School, then served in the 1st Battalion Auckland Regiment before joining the RNZAF in 1938. He transferred to the RAF in 1939, to complete his pilot training and on arrival in England joined No 210 Squadron.

In December 1940 he ferried a Sunderland flying boat to Malta, and flew it there for No 228 Squadron. When the remnants of the squadron had to leave in March 1941, Wg Cdr Lamond flew one of the two surviving Sunderlands to Egypt.

On April 24 he was sent to Suda Bay in Crete and flew to Kalamata, where he picked up 74 men of an RAF squadron fleeing the German invasion. Ordered to fly back to Kalamata that night, without a flare path, he and three members of his crew were captured after the Sunderland hit an obstruction.

The New Zealander was one of the first three men to escape from a tunnel at Stalag Luft III, Goering's showcase camp near Sagan in Poland for captured Allied airmen -- one he claimed was escape-proof.

In the spring of 1942, the New Zealander and two Britons were sealed into a tunnel and burrowed for 36 hours, piling the soil behind them, and breathing through air holes poked through the surface. They escaped into the woods but were recaptured a week later.

Wg Cdr Lamond worked on three more tunnels at the camp before the Great Escape of March 24 1944, when he was the dispatcher who controlled the flow of prisoners into the tunnel.

Just after he had sent off his 87th escaper, the tunnel was discovered: 76 men had broken free, of whom 50 were later murdered by the Gestapo.

In January 1945, the camp was evacuated. The prisoners marched west in terrible winter weather to avoid the advancing Soviet army, and were repatriated from a camp near Lubeck.

Wg Cdr Lamond remained in the RAF and was an operations controller in Germany during the Berlin Air Lift of 1949, and later a flying instructor in Southern Rhodesia before retiring from the RAF in 1962.

In December 1942 the King of the Hellenes awarded the New Zealander the Greek Distinguished Flying Cross. For his activities as a PoW he was mentioned in despatches, and in 1953 he received a Queen's Commendation for Valuable Services in the Air.

Wg Cdr Lamond died on January 15, and is survived by two sons and a daughter.