0:04 all of tonight's rescues are true stories we've sometimes used actors and stuntmen that everything you see and hear is based on the accounts of the people involved they've helped us to reconstruct events as they happen [Applause] [Music] tonight on 999 seconds to live and one chance to save them [Applause] [Music]
0:52 overboard and helpless in the path of a runaway boat [Applause] and video reporter Fiona Foster with the Navy's mine squad [Music] this is an ordinary Street in the London suburb of Putney it's a quiet residential area the last sort of place where people would expect anything dramatic to happen but on a bitterly cold January day it was devastated by an explosion that killed several of the people who lived here and changed the lives of others completely the whole central section of this block of flats was instantly demolished they managed to put the building's back together again quickly enough it wasn't quite so simple
1:37 for some of the people inside who survived tonight we show what happened to an extraordinary woman who was caught up in the events of that day and the strength the courage and the skill of those who tried to help her qualities they found in themselves just when they needed the most in recreating what happened we've used BBC news pictures and Fire Brigade video shot on the day and talked to the people involved but the drama of that day happened away from the cameras under a teetering mass of rubble there we've used an actor and an actress to reconstruct what happened for Ava and Karen clergy who were born in Czechoslovakia a normal working day starting with
2:23 breakfast together in the flat that they share the caretaker dutchy Jellison comes on duty at 6:00 a.m. but he usually waits until just after 7:00 before taking the morning mail to the people living in the flats by Dutch she never made the call Ava didn't get to work it's now 7:14 and her world is about to be blown apart
3:09 [Applause] News is coming in let's six flats have collapsed in southwest London after an explosion and 16 people are feared trapped they've gone in the middle and that is the bedroom area obviously the time of the morning sometime after seven o'clock you can guess who's in the bed Scotland Yard says it's believed an explosion was caused by gas we heard a few minutes ago with several people are said to have been killed well I couldn't have expected anybody to survive it was such total devastation nothing could prepare you really for for the site of the building itself the whole center section of the block of flats had collapsed into a huge pile the desperate search for survivors goes on all morning
3:57 they bring in a thermal imaging camera to try to detect body heat under the rubble two hours after the explosion eight people are still unaccounted for including ever and her sister essentially puts the stage there nobody felt that there were any more survivors however we know from experiences from the last war and from other major disasters that one never really gives up hope it was almost first the time that we were thinking of returning back to the hospital when suddenly a hush fell over the whole area we believe we've heard sounds of
4:44 knocking from under the pepper on the far side we've got a small crew now working inside we know that slab using one of our thermal-imaging cameras the town detective body under the she was in fact in the bathroom and the roof section had collapsed onto the bar which had protected her and this small void was where the main part of her body was but her leg was badly crushed so we had to find a different access point and in doing so we started the a tunnel thought to tunnel towards the casualty and the
5:31 sound of the tapping all the time there was a possibility in disturbing one side that this would cause a further collapse so it was a case of working slowly and very carefully in concert with all the crews that were there and by that time we'd established a conversation with the casualty [Music] sorry boy you could be with you in a minute don't worry lovely come in hand where
6:30 does it hurt Eva no way feel nothing you can't feel anything at all working as hard as they can to get you out thank you I'll be back the man who made that vital first contact with Ava was the fireman Peter Simpson actually managing to make physical contact with her was really good then once we discovered how bad her injuries were particularly the crush injury to our leg then we became concerned six hours after the explosion and there's another problem a large overhang of masonry is teetering directly over wherever is
7:15 trapped it could collapse at any moment if it does it will kill her and her rescuers the ceiling above you as well because at the moment it's unstable so I want to Jack out before we start moving you okay yes is Karen all right my sister um obviously I'm not too sure of the details of what's happening out there but everything's being done but that can be done tell her I'm all right you tell her yep okay don't worry with the delivery we came to wish she certainly was alive but they weren't
8:02 sure what her state was and they asked me to go down to try and make some initial assessment to see whether she whether she'd even survived any further masonry removal even yes I'm a doctor I'm here to help the rubble could have collapsed the bar over her could have given way and rather than collapse on her could have collapsed on myself but one doesn't really think about their own safety in those situations so whole adrenaline is is turned on and you address the problem in hand which was saving the the girl in the rubble my back is hurting can you feel this
8:51 no can you wiggle your toes I can't do anything much you're very cold I was actually quite concerned because she had suffered a severe injury to the knee of one of her legs and there wasn't enough room for us to turn her and pull her out by the arms so the only way that we could remove her from this tight area was to pull her out by the legs we're nearly ready to bring him out the big decision came in concert with the doctor to actually remove now only one person could work down the tunnel at any any given time so we were gonna have
9:37 to bring her out feet first the only way we could bring her out food first was by dragging her bio loads 2:15 p.m. seven hours after the explosion and ever is finally freed from the rubble she still doesn't know that her sister has died I remember the day light it was like the best thing I had seen I came out and I felt you know obviously being claustrophobic it was like to to feel the fresh air and you know to see the sky and that it felt like being reborn really the success is down to team efforts although there was four of us who worked on the physical rescue of
10:22 this one at all times there was fifty or sixty other firefighters out there working with us ever spent seven months in hospital and underwent over 40 operations she'll never forget every moment of those seven hours she was trapped there was absolutely there was total silence I didn't hear a sound after that initial sort of explosion that noise I heard and there was nothing much really I could do except waiting to be rescued but once you hear voices and you think you know that I hope that it will turn out all right because you feel close to safety but you could be such a long way away really I tried to move my my left hand and I I sort of felt something like a
11:09 smooth surface and I tried to knock on it just you know to sort of be heard but I wasn't actually at that point I I i was just move uncomfortable than anything I also remember hearing somebody saying you know we might as well take her leg off because she won't be able to use it anymore and that's scared that scared me a lot because I thought you know if if they amputate it without me having any sort of a I mean I I just thought I hope that give me that shot of the choice I thought over my life I thought of thought if I have to die now then I I don't regret dying because I had a good life but I thought it would be nice to be found you know that's really what I thought it's a situation that one doesn't run
11:54 across every single day and ever was a very important person I mean as much as I I admired her for her bravery I haven't seen her much since but I was delighted to be invited to her wedding subsequent to that and I'm glad to say she still has both her legs my relationship with dr. Perry Powell even though I don't see him anymore you know I mean he he is I have my myself believe in people really has been restored in a way because of people like him and my husband and you know the fire you know the ambulance man the scene you know the these people I I can't I can't
12:41 say enough about them [Applause] still to come on $9.99 the runaway speedboat that terrorized a West Country Resort and how you could help save a life yourself [Music] there's always an element of danger about jumping out of an airplane with a parachute that's what gives it its thrill its excitement that's what makes people do it but you wouldn't expect much danger if you jumped with two highly trained instructors a next report is about a freak accident and what seemed to us to be a miraculous escape
13:27 it happened 12,000 feet up to three parachutists as they fell to earth at 120 miles an hour it began as a birthday treat for a first-time skydiver he and those two instructors have helped us recreate exactly what happened using the video that one of them was actually shooting as they fell my mother was very concerned that my brothers were taking the mickey out at me to say the least well I was saved by a friend of mine and I did it for my birthday retreat myself I'd been passed using for living now for
14:13 22 years and I'd never seen as much as a serious injury so it really is a very very safe sport this was an absolute chance in a million it's quite a frightening experience since the phallus they don't know anything about it when they get here so we show them as much as possible before we actually do the gym what we're gonna do we're going up to 12,000 feet in the sky Vaughn yeah we're gonna jump out tree fall down to 6,000 feet open the main parachute now down stick around few things that I need you to know but I'll tell you as we go along but you don't have to do much so we explain to them what the canif is like how soft it is how gentle it is a nassif is how are they always open I've never had one not open and I've done
15:00 over a thousand jumps I've never had a canopy that's not opened properly now when we're landing we need to flare the canopy so we put the undesirable the brief is the same every time for all students gotta do a tandem jump we show them all the equipment exactly how we got to get in and out of the air out of plane it helps to give them more confidence I'm just going to show you this appeared here before we go out to the aircraft so as you know they've got a lot to inspect yeah stood at the back of the van here I'll get into position you can hear me okay yeah so I'm gonna shout fear every day about growing one sweat out I'm gonna deploy the draw yeah that gets this nice and stable I'll copy on the shoulders bring your arms out into the
15:45 stable stroke position like I told you yeah sound nice and stable it is yeah yeah okay the idea of the tandem jumps to give the novice all the sensation of skydiving and none of the worry the instructor strapped to his back has control and their parachute 6,000 feet they're about I'll wear - cameraman tell him we've got I don't pout and I'll let it go bro once that happens then just relax okay just stay nice and still I'll sort it all out make sure it's open top right and then we'll just fly down to earth okay great right what's going do it the weather conditions were perfect that day as they set off for the jump zone 12,000 feet over the Cambridgeshire
16:31 countryside [Music] okay kids look over the brief in everything was normal in mom and which it was quite calm and good student really and he seemed quite calm everything everything okay I felt pretty calm I was actually surprised how calm I I felt I think it was more sense of apprehension rather than anxiety the second instructor Ronnie O'Brien was there to film the first jump with his helmet camera as a souvenir
17:17 [Music] the next pictures you'll see are those that Ronnie's shot that day [Music] we went very steep and actually onto his back so looking back over the airplane flicked over once it done that we were face to earth and then went to deploy the drogue two bodies strapped together full faster than one so tandem jumpers use a small bro to slow them down to the speed of a solo jump this time things
18:02 went badly wrong the strap from the drogue hit Mike in the face so I reached over to push it away from her face and we actually turned around and it literally went our me neck and the Abney stuck there hung there and I was just looking straight up at the base of the pilots you the drove went out I could see that something was wrong I couldn't tell quite what at the time so I moved back away from over the top of the tandem in case Mike deployed his reserve parachute when he didn't I I dived down in front of them to see what was going on and normally you're doing around a hundred and twenty miles an hour in freefall so by diving towards them you accelerate 30
18:48 or 40 miles an hour till you catch up with them you then reduce your speed again back to a hundred and twenty miles an hour and then I could see that the bridle from the drogue parachute was right around Mike's neck and so I thought I could cut it I've got a knife I can coach it that'll give us a clean abundant for deserve so I reach from a knife to cut it but I've never really got old of it I just started fading away and fell asleep practically Ronnie the cameraman knew the two men's only chance was for him somehow to reach them and deploy their parachute before releasing his own all this while falling at a hundred and twenty miles an hour a few seconds left at all the time Richard the novice was unaware of the danger he was
19:33 in so I thought they were just playing a gentle practical joke on me I thought it had been far too calm and they were trying to show me here what real fear were he was in fact my reaction was not so much fear as anger because I thought this was really an unfair thing to do to me I didn't realize as any Thomas he'd gone unconscious so I started pointing to my reserved handle to suggest that he might like to pull his reserve when he didn't I decided to have a go myself they were spinning quite quickly and I had to get in through the rotation eventually managed to grab hold of them unfortunately wrong side initially and had to turn myself round the tandem / until I could get access to the reserved handle on this side which I was then
20:19 able to pull and the reserve parachute deployed i felt quite elated when i realized that the reserve was open and that they were going to be okay yeah I was pretty pleased at that point the next thing I knew was like waking up after quite a long sleep like waking up in the morning I'm being under parachute which like was totally illogical he cannot be under parachute when he just got out of bed surfing you know and I I couldn't work out how we got there for a second or two that frightened me a bit and I had to really look at the parachute look at the ground and look at the sky to convince myself that we were still here that we were still alive it wasn't until after we'd landed that had
21:05 actually been released from the harness and got up and turned around and saw that the damage that had been done to my he had a rope burn right across his neck and his face was bleeding from from the collision that happened in the air since the incident Mike's not changed at all he still refuses to buy the drink I have to to get my hand in my pocket when we go in the pub I know I'll look it we were to survive that and that got to me a little bit it's made me think more about and I don't know I'm more content with things you know like nothing's really that bad is it anymore so I find it I'm more content with life really I suppose
21:54 we want to hear more about people like the parachute instructor Ronnie O'Brien people who you think deserve recognition not just trained professional lifesavers but ordinary people who've done something special to help others who are in trouble at a reservoir in Essex 16 year old Christian Barry was fishing with friends when a little girl fell into the water there was thick mud on the reservoir bed but Christian who suffers from asthma and a hole in the heart finally found the girl totally submerged and unconscious and he managed to reach Briony Clark got her to safety and brought her round in this quiet country lane near Croydon a man collapsed in the road and stopped breathing moments later a passing
22:41 motorist Jayne crisp went to his aid she started giving him the kiss of life but it took a full 16 minutes to get him breathing again and in the Welsh Hills RSPCA men refused to give up when they tried to rescue three dogs crapped in a cave they spent 13 days burrowing through tunnels some only wide enough for a man at a time and finally found one dog alive a terrier named Sam if you know of someone whose story we can tell call us anytime on out 272 seven four double to zero at zero two seven two seven four double to double o each week on 999 a video reporter Fiona foster will be on the road with Britain's lifesavers for an insider's
23:26 view of their world what they do what makes them tick their triumphs and their tragedies this is what she uses just this little camcorder so she's a highly mobile one-woman television team who can get into places the bigger crews can't go and when you see how many people it normally takes just to film me talking to you then you'll understand how a woman who's reporter camera operator and sound recordist all-in-one has a better chance of keeping up when the alarm bells start to ring if you go into the beach this summer and you find some nice shells then by all means take them home but do make sure you know exactly what's type of shell you're dealing with
24:16 during the Second World War half a million minds both British and German were planted around the coast of Britain only a third of them have ever been found if they turn up at sea or on the shore anywhere between Scarborough and Bournemouth it's up to the Navy's Portsmouth clearance diving unit to sort them out their commanding officer is leftenant Ian Morton known to everyone as the boss no just coming to the busiest time of the year when people are out and about on the beaches and they find some unexploded ordnance bomb mine even parts of missiles sometimes turn up then the area is usually sealed off until we get there it's not your big territory there's still a lot of waiting it's all very
25:02 informal everyone's got a nickname and even the boss does the washing up already yeah I don't know what exactly that how serious something endorsed it I think yeah so SB on these mortars I'd like to put Fiona in there in the Land Rover if we can so you're just getting ready to go away right there's three mortars in a farmer's field and Plymouth are the nearest unit to this or normally would be but they're unable to go because of lack of people so we've been asked to attend and it's urgent and it is emergent it's a reasonably urgent job the army the operations
25:48 center have put a high priority on it so we've got to get down there as quickly as possible so finish your sandwich [Music] [Applause] this is rated a seat so emergency [Music] well two hours bumpy driving later and we're in deepest Dorset can I come with
26:33 you Tony the man in charge is chief petty officer Petri or tiny to the lads you've got there is basically a two inch mortar there's no clear identification mark so you have to the super worst possible hazard so we'll assume this has a test being an H II or high explosive Walter Baumann so the attentions will be done have a look at the other ones that they've got for us and then come back get the equipment and dispose of them in there in fact three mortars were found [Music] most of onto it make the detonator into that and then do a controlled explosion man you're fine obviously the main
27:20 consideration here again is safety and that's the reason that I should my opposite number to go back to firing point so we basically trying to achieve one man one risk evolution at this point back the firing point well deal with the first okay primate standby forest firing in danger no not at all no it's all [Music] you must be so I think it I think it's
28:06 like everything you become you just get used you know though there is an element a teacher there you don't honestly expect that innocent as one apart yeah I think if you did you wouldn't do it for phosphorus we've definitely call from Yarmouth coast guard advising us that the coast guard at Hunt Stanton in Norfolk has reported about four times possible World War two shells he's now put that in the system and you know without that get tasked on that one [Music] at low tide next morning we met Norfolk Coast Guard Colin Tomlinson had a report for public when the bait diggers that they've seen something look like a shell
28:52 at the beach and told me where it was and I came down a c5 which I believe to be shells because this area is well-known but during the war is being a bombing range shutting range and there's been thousands found over the last two years and a Davies being up or consonant blow them up very nice though some reason some people tend to like it the
29:40 suspect shells were covered in modern plastic explosive this stuff is ten times more potent than gunpowder on its own it's safe in the right hands but wired to a detonator it's potentially lethal and I connected up thanks much didn't detonate should we keep clears firing table this is understand it's here on the beach we're now gonna detonate so you might get some 999 calls in from logics pros on the beach okay back to the vehicle father seems you're happy one or all of these shells could be live so we retired
30:27 to a safe distance look it primed barring now so time now for a quick tea break before they head back that's this one Beach cleared for today the tides could bring up more stuff tomorrow by then they'll be back at base waiting for the call to come over 700 miles of coastline this small band of men have to protect all year-round this is Seoul come in South Devon for most of the air it's a peaceful seaside town but in the summer they call it Gerrard's cross on sea because it attracts swarms of well-heeled holidaymakers from around London it's the watersports they come for of
31:13 course you don't need a license you don't need any experience to drive a boat anybody can get out on the water a next report shows how serious accidents can happen even in a peaceful and picturesque place like this the story begins at Star whole Bay just a mile down the coast Isabel Jackson is played by an actress but Jamie Fisher takes part as himself she was quite excited about being out on the water and she wanted to learn how to ski okay I was using my boat it's just a Dory a small 40 horsepower on the back but
31:58 the the bay that we all use it's lovely big bay with a small Cove in the corner and we're just ski around and everyone on the rocks watching [Music] further up the bay the Doobie Brothers were out in their speedboat [Music] we've just got a new engine arms the back the boat we were just sort of
32:44 shooting around at around the bay not looking for anything in particular not doing anything particular just wasting fuel [Music] I didn't know Jamie at all really but and you live slightly but dining in through my brother and Isabel and Isabelle and Jamie had been skiing for half an hour when something happened that no one could have anticipated Oh Solomon from side to side and when I was out to the right hand side she was going towards the little Cove where the beach was and turned very early Randy the
33:31 rocks before I expected it [Music] when seeing a just rolling out the back of the boat and just watching the boat cavitation just half in half out of water when the speed had no one in it Jamie managed to swim away from the path of the boat and was picked up but Isabelle was still in the danger zone [Music]
34:19 isabell managed to duck underneath the boat but it was locked into a tight circle and has started to come round again [Applause] [Music] just off to our right those we noticed somebody in the water then we saw the
35:05 dory come round being towards the body in water and then when it didn't stop we were as there was something wrong I ran towards her some very morbid thoughts well my only morbid thought was that whether she had a head left or not because the damage that prop could do is quite horrendous grab hold of his shoulder and pulled her up right she was unconscious at this time well sis bringing her back to our baby the other boats came round again
35:58 [Music] the boat missed guys head by inches when I go back to our boats and I passed her arms to ollie my brother and you grabbed hold of her wrists and just pulled up as far as you could knew we had to get back to a populated bit of land as soon as possible in the nearest place was South Sands beach [Music]
36:56 [Applause] [Music] [Applause]
37:49 because the beach was a bit done we decided that we hope to get her head off the ground because of a large cut in her head she was just about breathing not very well the heartbeat was was okay she kept on catching her teeth so my brother put his hand in on there was something known maybe bit it off but in the bay the runaway boat was causing chaos they tried to get on board but it was just going too fast
38:35 okay keep still somebody tell me your name on a rock on a boat a boat okay just keep still just is anywhere else okay just keep this on still you're gonna be fine you out at sea they were trying to throw a rope into the path of the runaway boat the idea was to snag the propeller and stop it Ysabel everything's fine just just keep these IEP the hasty examination and realize that she was really well that she got a good pulse that in fact she was not in the immediate danger of
39:23 anything awful but I thought that she might fit because she was showing some signs of cerebral irritation grinding her teeth and appearing very agitated and rather twitchy so just watch watch your head now what's your head still everything's funny oh here I was attested to get items I was worried about whether she would be weak down the left side whether she'd have some memory loss she might initially I wasn't feeling at all upset as my hands were taken away from the situation the doctor
40:08 took over it's strange because I felt sad and I felt slightly guilty almost even though I didn't know who it was somebody came up to me and said don't worry will untrained in this sort of situation I know how to handle it seeing me being fairly upset and I was pretty angry with him I didn't say anything I mean he didn't he didn't realize that it was me who had done all the saving say
40:56 he didn't know what I'd done through he just thinks he can just Swan up and I just annoyed me intensely I thought thought it was most courageous rescue I think within the units after the accident that the dudeney brothers became involved my life was saved I think stood in the boat waiting for help as many of us would in that very frightening situation Isabelle would have been lost forever in those few moments they pulled her out of the sea and resuscitated her and gave
41:42 back to her the rest of her life which she would otherwise most certainly lost I'm sure I don't affect after the ambience to come my on I felt so empty and as if that was it and you can go back to a life Buckley normally now and just don't worry about it [Music] Isabelle spent three days on a life-support system and a whole year coming to terms with her injuries they've left her with epilepsy strange because I don't remember what actually happened but when I woke up I knew
42:27 something had happened I sort of knew my head's at something or is not so much wrong but something had happened that had changed things well when I came around I I mean there wasn't really any pain at all I I don't know if I was on some sort of painkillers or something but I don't the funny thing is I've never really experienced any sort of painful mystic accident other than when it went on unfortunately I don't remember that I was watching ghosts which most people have seen and there's a bit it's something flying in my head and I had a flashback of being on the beach at South Sea I don't know I just got the feeling
43:14 of being really badly injured just sort of moaning and just sort of there being other people around yeah I can't see anything in my head I just got this really awful feeling and they're just the emotional feeling but being totally helpless and I'm really badly injured there's a ridge that runs down where the propeller hit but that's a natural dental in my skull I saw the rest of it there's nothing I don't think all the scars gathered up my my hair
43:59 fortunately nothing shows so I'm still fighting you it's not I'll never get back to normal either it's mainly the epilepsy that's been the change because the scar is still settling down Marcus is also active I met him on the first day of term and up until that point which was an entire year I hadn't met anybody who's hair black thick I thought it's a real relief to be able to talk to somebody yours and we just got talking and I've been with him ever since and that's something when you come round you've got two options open to you can
44:46 lie back and take the sympathy and get well slowly if your body would that's you you can try and fight back you can get on with their you can disable this isn't going to stop me I'm all right tonight now I'm right only I'm gonna get on with it so that's what I did one man who believes that the sort of accident that happened to Isabel really shouldn't ever happen again his soul comes Harbormaster Peter Hodges there's also Secretary of the local RNLI well at the moment in this country we have a situation where anybody at all including if you like to take extreme a four-year-old child and legally step into if you like a Ferrari of the water
45:34 a high-powered engine on the back and drive it there's nothing to stop him which it's not common with the rest of Europe and if you like the developed world there's a very good example there I don't know how old he is but I just think I'm the 10th and the boats capable of 45 miles now in the case of Isabel's accident there were several other things for instance there is a kill switch fitted to the engine and given a little bit of Education and instruction which I believe she probably didn't have but even if we're not talking about her specific case it's the general safety by using a the kill switch when you fall out of a boat the engine stops what would you like to see change to make
46:21 this sort of activity a lot safer well within the harbour we can make our own bylaws and we're doing that and we're limiting 16 year olds to 10 horsepower engine outside the harbour is a different story and really the only way to address the problem in my view is on a national basis so what do you want done we we need a level of competence before somebody is allowed to drive a boat which in effect means a form of license similar to that needed for car so driving test and driving test and then to be absolutely honest when somebody misbehaves themselves just as on the roads you could take the license away which might be a great help to a lot of
47:06 people trying to manage the safety round the place as we saw Isabelle was very lucky that guy and Oliver dude needed at least some of the right things that helped save her life it's in those crucial two or three minutes after an accident that lives are saved or lost everybody knew instead of them would you have been able to help first aid experts say it's always better to have a little knowledge and do something rather than do nothing and wait for help to arrive it can be very easy to help save a life there are four simple things that you would learn how to do on any first aid course one check for breathing to stop any bleeding apply
47:52 pressure directly with a pad or even with your fingers three learn the simple ABC of resuscitation airway breathing and circulation how to open the airway [Music] how to do mouth-to-mouth breathing and how to restart the circulation and four learn how and when to use the recovery position [Music] remember most accidents happen in the home or on journeys so the chances are that the person you may have to help will be someone in your family or
48:39 someone you know could you help obviously that's not intended to be any comprehensive practical guide to life-saving but if you do want to find out more about first aid then the some John Ambulance Association has produced a free fact sheet if you want a copy send a stamped addressed envelope to some John Ambulance one Grosvenor Crescent London sw1 x7e F and you can find that address together with other 999 life-saving information on Ceefax page six to two next week on 999 a grim car crash that should have killed the driver outright but left him on the edge of death with only the speed and skill of his rescuers to save him and the boy who fell into a gorilla pit
49:27 the parents nightmare come true [Music] the number again for your rescue stories and local heroes Oh 272 74 double tuned mm all right to 999 BBC Bristol ds-82 LR [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]
