Paratrooper and motorcycle rider Thierry Vladikine died Sunday at the age of 62. He had been battling illness and was checked into the Clinique Claude Bernard in Albi.
Vladikine was a member of the French Marines‘ 8th Marine Infantry Parachute Regiment in the 1980s, particularly working at the garrison in Castres. The 8e RPIMa (8e Régiment de Parachutistes d’Infanterie de Marine) primarily serves as a peacekeeping unit.
In1988, he entered the Paris–Dakar Rally on a Suzuki DR 600 prepared by twice champion Gaston Rahier. Many French military personnel often took part in the race during its infancy; the 1988 edition also included members of the 1st Infantry Regiment of the Republican Guard. The following year, Vladikine switched to a Kawasaki KLR 650.
He wrapped up his service as a master corporal. In 2021, Vladikine was among 236 French veterans—including thirty Marines—who signed an open letter penned by former officer Jean-Pierre Fabre-Bernadac to President Emmanuel Macron to warn of civil war if the country continued upon its current trajectory. The letter, heavily right wing and anti-immigrant in rhetoric, received an endorsement from far-right leader and presidential aspirant Marine Le Pen and was regarded as a threat of a coup d’état.
“It is with sadness that I inform you that the 8th Para Thierry Vladikine has just made his last jump, to join the DZ (drop zone) of the brave under the wings of our patron saint Michel,” reads a statement from an unofficial 8e RPIMa site run by paratrooper Jean-Daniel Salles. “Died in his 62nd year on July 14, 2024 of illness at the C.Bernard clinic in Albi. He had served with the 8 RPIMa in the 1980s at the HQ of the Regiment. A motorcycle enthusiast, he had run the Paris-Dakar under the colors of the 8th.”
His service and burial will be at Le Mée-sur-Seine.
