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Australian pilot Paul Royle was one of just 76 airmen who escaped from the notorious Stalag Luft III camp in Nazi-occupied Poland in March 1944.  The men escaped through a secret tunnel they

built from the Prisoner of War camp 71 years ago. Their courageous effort was immortalised in 1963 film The Great Escape, starring Steve McQueen.  Mr Royle died in a Perth hospital, Western

Australian, on Sunday after surgery for a fractured hip.  His son Gordon Royle described how his father had lived life to the fullest, until he suffered a fall at his nursing home. The war

hero's death leaves just one final Great Escape survivor alive - 94-year-old Dick Churchill, a former British squadron leader.  Mr Royle revealed last year, on the 70th anniversary of

the heroic tunnel escape, that he wan't fan of the Hollywood interpretation of the story. Referring to McQueen's dramatic bid to outrun his Germans captors on a motorbike, he said:

"The movie I disliked intensely because there were no motorbikes ... and the Americans weren't there." Mr Royle modestly said he did not regard himself as special because of

his role in the legendary episode. Recalling the moment he escaped, he said: "It was very pleasant and all we saw was great heaps of snow and pine trees.  "There was snow

everywhere, it was cold."  He walked with another escapee and spent two days hiding in bushes, but they were soon recaptured by the Nazis.  Only three of the men who escaped reached

safety. Of the 73 recaptured, 50 were shot.  Mr Royle was liberated by British troops from the Marlag und Milag Nord prison camp in Germany on May 2, 1945. A memorial service will be held

for Mr Royle in his hometown of Perth on Wednesday.