Horrif ic toll of injuries suf fered by victims of Clutha crash
AN inquiry into the Clutha helicopter crash yesterday heard grim details of the injuries that led to the deaths of ten people.
The Fatal Accident Inquiry (FAI) was given harrowing evidence detailing the final moments of those killed.
The third day of the probe, held at Hampden Park, Glasgow, was told the majority of the victims died from head and chest injuries as a direct result of the crash.
It also heard that others lost their lives after becoming trapped under the weight of rubble and aircraft wreckage, with the cause of death of one pub customer being described as ‘traumatic asphyxia’.
A joint minute read out to the court revealed that three of the victims had a faint pulse when found by paramedics and a fourth was moving his head and ‘mumbling’ before later dying from head, chest and neck injuries.
The victims were killed and 32 others injured when a police helicopter crashed through the roof of the Clutha Vaults bar in Glasgow on November 29, 2013.
The aircraft had been returning from a call-out to Bargeddie, Lanarkshire, to its base on the banks of the Clyde in Glasgow when it fell out of the sky at 10.22pm. Air Accidents Investigation Branch senior inspector Marcus Cook also told the FAI that pilot David Traill would have had 40 seconds to react when the first engine flamed out at around 500ft to 600ft.
When the second engine followed, there would have been fewer than ten seconds to respond. He said there were indications the pilot tried to have the helicopter auto-rotate to land with a degree of safety, but this did not work.
Mr Cook said the first low fuel light, of five warnings, would have come on when the pilot was over Bothwell, about 11 miles from the city centre, and at that time he would have been expected to land within ten minutes.
More than 100 people were at the Clutha when the helicopter crashed through the roof.
Victims were later named as pub customers Robert Jenkins, 61, Mark O’Prey, 44, Gary Arthur, 48 John McGarrigle, 57, Colin Gibson, 33, Samuel McGhee, 56, and Joe Cusker, 59. Helicopter pilot Mr Traill, 51, and the two crew, PC Tony Collins, 43, and PC Kirsty Nelis, 36, were also killed.
The inquiry also heard Mr Traill could have been ‘dangerously misled’ by an error in a maintenance manual which confused minutes with kilograms.
During questioning by Donald Findlay, QC, representing the family of victim Mr Jenkins, Mr Cook was asked if the pilot would have had three to four minutes from one engine flaming out due to fuel shortage and the second also doing so.
Mr Cook said it would not be minutes but kilograms of fuel. He added: ‘The maintenance manual is incorrect. It would be three to four kilograms – hence about a minute.’
Mr Cook said the maintenance manual had since been changed.
Mr Findlay asked: ‘If the pilot knew about the gap and understood it to be three or four minutes, he had been badly misled? ‘If he knew,’ Mr Cook replied. He said it was ‘probably but maybe unlikely’ that the pilot was aware of the manual as it was for maintenance.
The Crown Office has previously said there is insufficient evidence for criminal proceedings.
The inquiry continues.