Life Patrol - On the Banks of the Foyle

Foyle Search and Rescue are a group of volunteers in Londonderry

who are on suicide's front line.

They patrol the waters and banks of the River Foyle,

which runs through the city, to stop people jumping.

Oh, oh, oh, let me go!

Can't let you go, we can't let you go.

Oh, oh, oh!

Trying to save their lives in the water...

We had a pager call to say there was somebody

they think in the water here.

..and searching for the bodies of those they couldn't save.

I don't think he's ever even kissed a girl or anything,

you know, and that's so sad.

We're going to be on their shoulders over their busy Christmas period...

Happy Christmas.

Happy Christmas. You're a credit there to the town.

You're walking angels.

..as they fight to drive a wedge between life...

and death.

93.1 FM and 792 medium wave. BBC Radio Foyle.

BBC Radio Foyle news at two, this is Brian Kernohan.

The family of a Derry man missing from his home in the city

since the weekend have asked anyone with any information

that might help them find him to come forward.

Eamonn Moore was last seen in the early hours of Saturday morning

near where he was living in the Magazine Street area of the city.

His sister, Mairead Moore, urged him to get in touch.

Just to say we all really, really love him,

and we know it's been really hard for us all but...

'me and my sister are there for him.

'We know it's been really hard since my mum died,

'but we're all, we're all there for him.'

Eamonn left his apartment on Shipley Street in Derry.

He left in the very early hours of Saturday morning,

Friday night, Saturday morning.

He sent a text message to his sister in Australia...

..and the message was, "Sorry".

And he sent the same message to my brother,

who was his best friend.

Now, when they got the message the next day,

that started to send alarm bells then through the family.

So, the police was contacted,

and the Foyle church was contacted,

and that's the way it's been ever since.

Well, we search every day.

Liam's over on the other side, and friends and his brothers

and sisters, and all our aunts and uncles.

Everybody has their own wee kind of patch,

their own wee kind of area that'll be looked after.

And when we first were here,

we were all kind of based here

and I was convinced he was going to come up here,

because this is where they think his entry point was.

I soon realised that's not the case.

We kind of have to just to go looking for him, you know.

It's vitally important that we get him in home now

and get a bit of closure, especially for his two sisters.

He was very close to his sisters and his grandma and his uncle Neil,

and, uh...

Derry, in common with the rest of Northern Ireland,

has a suicide problem, in particular amongst young men.

We have seen a dramatic increase in suicide,

and the last official figures that we've seen for 2010

were showing that there were 313 people

died by suicide in Northern Ireland.

Our statistics show that there are more people dying by suicide

than there are people dying on the roads.

That leaves Northern Ireland with the highest suicide rate

per thousand-head of population in the UK.

Our river within this city, the Foyle,

unfortunately has become a focus for people

seeing it as a method for taking their lives.

The River Foyle, which runs through the centre of Derry,

has always been at the heart of the city.

It is both beautiful and deceptively dangerous.

The water is totally underestimated in and around the city.

I think it's purely because it runs through the city

and it doesn't look as bad.

It's not... At places it's not the widest.

You'd think you could nearly swim it.

I think maybe there's only one or two people that has succeeded.

99% of the time the river won.

Foyle Search and Rescue is a charity formed 19 years ago

as a community reaction to an 18 month period

where 36 lives were lost in the river, many through suicide.

It's aim is to save life in and around the Foyle.

As well as patrolling the waters and banks of the river,

it's now deeply embedded into the local community,

working closely with the Western Health and Social Services Trust,

the police, and in schools

in water safety awareness and suicide prevention.

'They're viewed as'

the fourth emergency organisation here in the city.

And they're a very unique organisation, because they don't

actually exist in a lot of other places throughout the world.

So, it's been community-driven, it's been driven by families.

As leading volunteer Sean Edwards knows,

they have their work cut out.

Different hazards for different areas, you know,

and you can never underestimate the danger of the river here

because of its coldness and it's fast flowing.

Whenever the tide's pelting out here

it's one of the fastest flowing rivers in Europe.

What makes their job tougher

is that the river is spanned by three bridges.

Well, this is Craigavon Bridge.

This is the oldest bridge in the city,

unique in that it has two decks on it, upper and lower deck.

The newest addition to Derry's waterfront is the Peace Bridge.

There is life rings placed right the way along here,

so, if someone goes in in the middle here,

if someone was here quickly enough and threw them a ring,

there's a possibility that will help to keep them above until the boat arrives.

And, as with any tall structure, the Foyle Bridge,

known locally as the New Bridge,

brings an added dimension to helping keep the public safe.

When you look up there...

it's scary stuff. Scary stuff when you're dealing with it, too.

It's quarter to nine now and we're just opening up,

getting ready for another night, normal Thursday night duty.

Foyle Search and Rescue mount regular evening patrols

on the banks and waters of the river,

and have a rescue boat on 24 hour standby.

They rely entirely on volunteers giving up their time for no pay.

We can't completely know until the night

how many people's going to come out and what they'll be doing,

so it's more or less we have to wait

just up until before we go out just to see who turns up,

then at the very last minute we have to split the teams up

into their duties, you know.

Says he's getting a pay rise of 0%.

-A pay rise?

-Aye.

-Well, what about...

-I want it back-dated, six years!

What about getting paid overtime?

You're here for the charity.

Our man there likes to live the good life.

Terry's the person that eats everything in the whole place.

He's like a bean pole and he could eat for a family of five.

Eating as much as I do, I should look like him.

See, that's low now. That's low.

You need to be thick-skinned in here.

That's one thing, you need to have a sense of humour,

thick skin and plenty of time.

That's three things.

Craig has been with the charity half his life.

When I was 16 and came into the charity

for the Duke of Edinburgh Awards,

I didn't expect that, 16 years down the line,

I'd be here as a Chairperson.

Work - that is second best, like.

This is what I love doing, this is, you know, who I am.

Hello, Dave. All right?

It's 9pm.

On duty tonight is a team christened after

a certain German confectionary product.

-The Haribo team.

-Yes, lads!

There we go. That's your food for the night, boys.

Right, there you go. OK.

Team leader tonight is Terry Carr.

There's a lot of people out partying today.

So, that should spill over into the night,

so just keep an eye out, the usual thing, you know.

Especially down round zone five later on.

On duty nights, the team drive a loop

around the bridges of the River Foyle,

looking for people who may be in a vulnerable state of mind.

Basically, we start from one end,

which is zone one, that's Craigavon Bridge,

and then we go right the whole way down the river bank

and over the Foyle Bridge and back round again,

and just do a full circle, basically, of all zones.

All volunteers are trained in suicide intervention

to exactly the same level that is mandatory

for mental health workers in the health service.

'The signs we look for, if someone's stationary,'

like standing looking over at the water,

that's normally a tell-tale sign that we look for,

and if they are stationary we would wait for a while

and see if they move on.

If they're on the phone, as well,

that could be them on the phone having an argument.

As well as a shore presence,

on duty nights Foyle Search and Rescue have a boat on the water

patrolling the full length of the city waterfront.

When not driving, the jeep team park up at the Craigavon Bridge.

This is sweetie time.

This is our supper.

It's five to eleven, this is our supper.

Fried or poached?

I'll take a fried egg.

Take two fried eggs.

It can be very frustrating sitting here,

just waiting for something to happen.

We're not really willing for things to happen, but...

Things just do have a habit of coming out of the blue, you know.

You could be sitting here for hours. Well, actually you could be

sitting here for a couple of days, actually, before anything happens.

The way it works is you can get one incident a night,

or you can get five incidents a night.

You don't know when you're coming on duty until the night's over.

Dave spots an unsettling clue that tonight might be a busy night.

People seeking to take their own lives

sometimes leave belongings on the side of the river before jumping.

The woman who has put the suitcases there makes a dash for the railings.

Woah, you're all right you're all right...

WOMAN SCREAMING

Don't worry.

WOMAN SOBBING

Calm down, you're all right, don't worry.

Don't worry, you're fine.

WOMAN CRYING

Calm down, you're all right. You're all right.

You OK?

Come on, have a wee seat there first.

The boat is nearly half a mile away.

They race to the scene.

-WOMAN:

-Let me go.

-We can't let you go.

We're not going to let you go in there.

Come on, just talk to us.

I'm getting soaked here!

So are we, so it's all right, you'll be worse in there, like.

It'll only take me two seconds to get over there.

Won't you let me go?

Well, we're not going to let you go, that's the point.

Lisa, police.

Let me go.

We can't let you go.

Let me go!

Can't let you go. We can't let you go.

-CRYING:

-Let me go!

I want to go!

Aye, Lisa's going to phone them now.

No one's going to stop me.

Just let me walk away.

We can't let you walk away.

It's going to be worse in there.

I don't care what it's like in there.

I've been through worse.

You all right?

I guess so.

I'll have to be cos these guys won't leave me alone.

-You're right, we're not...

-I'm stuck to them now.

Your scarf's stuck to us.

You're stuck with us now, all right.

I'll still try.

You cold?

No, I'm not cold.

I'd be even colder if I go in there.

Exactly. You don't want to be in there.

-Don't be talking like that now.

-Just call my kids, OK?

I'm not calling no-one for you, I can't do that.

If you're saying you're going to jump in there,

-I'm not going to call them for you.

-Right, let me go then.

-We can't.

CRYING

All right. You're all right.

-Come on, come over and sit on the wall and you can talk to us.

-OK.

Come and sit on the wall.

It's standard practice,

if someone has made an attempt to get over the railings,

to call the police and ambulance services.

Clients - as Foyle Search and Rescue call the people they help -

are taken straight to hospital to get the support they need.

The lady there, she set her bags down,

and just took a wee walk over beside the railings.

As soon as she went for the railings that was us out of the Jeep.

As we approached her, she tried to climb the railings and go over,

So that's us brought her back,

and then when we have brought her back to try and talk to her,

she's got very agitated and worked up.

We were standing there for around five minutes just with our arms

kind of out like this here, to try and stop her from going in.

Certainly, if we weren't here, that woman could have been in the water

and we could be looking for a body tomorrow.

-Go on ahead.

-All right, see you later.

'There's no doubt that ten seconds, if we had waited,

'she'd have been in the river.'

We have saved a life tonight, there's no question about that.

It's not that people want to die,

it's that they want to end their pain.

The problem is, they can't see any other way

of how to end their pain other than through suicide.

Barry McGale is the Suicide Liaison Officer

for the local health authority,

and he works closely with Foyle Search and Rescue

in both suicide prevention and dealing with its aftermath.

If we can get in early enough and provide support for them,

we can help them see other solutions to their problem.

It is important that we create awareness around suicide,

particularly, you know, where people are concerned

about other ones who may be at risk of suicide.

So, I think it's very much about empowering people.

When he isn't out on the banks of the Foyle,

Dave Smith holds down a full time job as a youth worker.

Make sure I get that back.

'It's a cross-community group.'

This is the older group that we have tonight,

and what they're doing is setting up a youth forum for themselves.

-What are you wearing that stupid hat for?

-It's not a hat!

Youth work's one of the things that I like doing

cos I got a lot of help whenever I was growing up.

How do we spell forum? F-O-R-M or F-O-U...no...

For-um.

F...?

..O-R-U-M.

We spelled it wrong, anyway.

I think that's how you spell it.

I wonder why you picked Frankie...

No! Don't put that there!

LAUGHTER

'Some of the people that I've worked with'

have never met someone of the other religion ever before,

which is strange to think.

Right, see you later.

Dave sees his youth work and his volunteering

for Foyle Search and Rescue as being linked.

'I would not want to see one of the kids that I work with'

end up anywhere near the Foyle in a situation

'where I will find them on a Thursday night

'or a Friday night or a Saturday night.'

That's one of the reasons I do the youth work, to make a difference in their lives.

It's on the run up to Christmas.

# Sleigh bells ring Are you listening?

# In the lane snow is glistening

# A beautiful sight

# We're happy tonight

# Walking in a winter wonderland... #

Happy Christmas, you're a credit there to the town.

You're walking angels, you're walking angels.

Fair play to you. Love these people.

While the people of Derry are gearing up for the holiday,

Craig and Terry are up early to look for the body

of the missing young person, Eamonn Moore.

A Saturday morning, where normal people off work for the weekend,

will be in their bed still.

Wee cafe here, McGinleys, down on Buncrana Road,

it's where we'd usually go to eat in the mornings.

If we don't get a bacon bap we go back to the base,

if we have enough time, to go get something to eat, a wee fry.

Thank you very much.

Aye.

Thanking you very much.

A major part of the charity's role in the city

is supporting the work of the coastguards and police

in recovering the bodies of those lost to the river.

They've never failed to find one yet.

Just hoping we get him, like, you know.

When we start we have to finish, and we have to keep going

until there's a result of one kind or another, you know.

At the riverside base, Paddy Wilson, one of the founder members,

briefs the team.

We're going out to do a search today, boys.

What we're looking for is items of clothing,

which will be a black coat with red stripes on it,

black boots, a pair of jeans.

Just checking the body bag here to make sure that the zip's intact...

..no holes, so that if we do have to use it it can be used cleanly, you know?

There will be some members of the family out as well,

so you need keep an eye out for them.

I'll be taking on two sides of the bank, down as far as Lisahally, right up as far as St Johnston,

taking either side and then down the middle.

And then we'll review it after that.

The river is really nice on a day like today, but you don't get to enjoy it.

Whenever you're doing a search, it totally detracts from the beauty that we have off the river.

Everything points to Eamonn being in the river -

phone and CCTV evidence pinpoints him being on the river bank before he sent the texts

that are giving his family and the police grave concern for his wellbeing.

If somebody enters the water, their body will sink to the bottom

and it will stay at the bottom until it starts to gas up.

It can take any number of days or weeks before the body gases up,

but when it rises then, sort of halfway from the bottom of the river bed to the surface,

that's actually what we would call "on the move".

A body could turn up basically anywhere.

If it comes up at night, it could go in and onto the shore,

and not move until the tide comes in and picks it up again.

This year alone we've saved 19 people's lives who actually went into the river.

And you know, this will be the fourth body we've recovered.

Eamonn's uncle Liam is also out searching the river banks for his nephew.

I'll just check up here.

It takes its toll on you, there's no question about that,

but this is the most important thing in my life at the minute,

to try and find my sister's son.

Well that's new anyway, that basket.

It's amazing, the rubbish that will float down there, you know?

Eamonn was very down when his mother died a few years ago, my sister.

And I think that played a big factor in his life because he was so close to his mother.

He was the kind of wee boy that would have been on the computer playing games.

He would be on eBay buying CDs and then passing them on,

that sort of way where he'd make himself a couple of pound -

not very much, right enough, but it kept him going, you know?

And that's what made us think that there was nothing wrong.

Eamonn's sister Mairead has returned from living in London to support the family during the search.

He's a very kind boy, very gentle, very quietly spoken.

He would babysit and do different things for different people.

he was just a really good, genuine boy.

He wasn't into partying and doing all that kind of crazy stuff,

he was just a normal, quiet, down-to-earth boy.

I don't he's ever even kissed a girl or anything, you know, and that's so sad.

Makes you feel bad inside, you know, like...

I think myself, I've had a pretty OK life -

not the greatest, but not the worst either -

but I've six children, I have a wife and he'll never have these things,

and that's the sad thing about it in a way.

He also had no life yet, 21 years...

It did come as a real shock, you know, because he was even

down at my granny's two days before and he was joking with my granny.

'It was just out of the blue and we're just...

'we'll always be questioning why.'

I never seen this coming, I never in my life would have thought he would have done this,

but still I can't help feeling guilty as well, that I didn't see it.

The authorities, too, have been leaving no stone unturned in their search for Eamonn.

The police send in the divers.

First of all they think it's less than one foot and it's pure black.

Even with a torch - they call it the night torch - no use at all. It's all touch.

despite the Irish coastguard sending a helicopter up from Sligo, 70 miles away,

to help with the search, there is still no sign of Eamonn.

Foyle Search and Rescue don't just get involved in suicide prevention and body recovery,

they also offer support to families affected by suicide.

It's not always talking about the search, you know,

they just want to come for a chat and a cup of tea.

And it's a sort of focus point, for the families to come to here.

The support group meets here on the first and third Monday of every month as well,

so there's always something going on.

The charity has been working closely with the Moore family

from the outset of Eamonn's disappearance.

Liam drops by to discuss progress.

The difficult thing for any family is the not knowing.

You know, it's just in our nature.

And that's harder for families because taking a disturbed...

I'm sure you just thought, "We'll get him in a day or two," and the weeks, the days go on, you know?

And then you even start doubting yourself, "Is he even in there?"

Eamonn's sister, Mairead, also values the support.

Paddy, he's been wonderful, keeping us updated constantly.

He's in daily contact. He's been doing a lot of other stuff, too, not just the searching.

They've taken me into their care for a couple of hours and given me counselling.

They've offered me support, to join their support groups.

They've done other stuff behind the scenes that you don't even see.

As well as looking from the boats, Foyle Search and Rescue

have themselves been out searching the riverbanks on foot.

With Eamonn wearing dark clothing as well, they blend in more.

That's where you could literally walk past him, you know?

You can see some of that debris and stuff that's lying there.

That's why every so often we'll go out on foot, usually once a week or so.

We were out there yesterday...

I'm going to take a wee scoot down here. Sure, give me a wee ring.

I'll take a look here now, I'll head on in and...

-I'll go further down, then.

-I'll talk to you later on.

All right, Liam. See you now, bye.

Paddy goes out for a further search of his own.

We don't want a loved one of anybody's lying on the riverbank,

we want to get it as soon as we possibly can for the family.

It makes it more poignant this time of year because

we're coming up to Christmas, we're a couple of days to Christmas.

Paddy was with Foyle Search and Rescue right from the start.

We absolutely started with nothing.

We had a public meeting where we asked people if they wanted to be involved

and that's basically it started off, with about 11 or 12.

Another of the longest-serving members is Helena.

She holds down a full time job as a cook, and for 19 years she has

juggled this job with turning out week after week for the charity.

I'm definitely not Mother Teresa, anybody that knows me I'm not,

but it's just the fact if you can do something for somebody and give them a chance, you know.

I'm hoping it gets me brownie points when I go up above...

Well, that's where I'm hoping I'm going - up above.

So there is method in my madness.

THEY CHAT

It was started because one of the founder members had lost his brother in the Foyle,

and rather than sitting at home and just waiting for somebody to bring them home,

they decided they would go out and look and walk up and down.

And all they had was 10p.

They always had 10p, whoever was out there made sure they had 10p to make a phone call.

The charity has come a long way since its humble beginnings

and now its work extends far beyond the river.

They are now part of the fabric of the city,

working closely with the health authorities and the emergency services.

But they have to find £90,000 a year, just to keep going.

They depend largely on the generosity of the people of Derry donating.

There was £5.71 in that one.

Sneaky fiver.

The money works hard.

As well as the regular patrols,

a highly trained core of Foyle Search and Rescue volunteers

are on 24-hour standby to launch one of its four lifeboats.

Each one of them is issued with a pager

and when a call-out, or shout, comes via the police,

they have to drop everything to get the lifeboat in the water.

Call-outs happen all the time.

Last year the boat was launched on average once every three days,

and the Christmas period is shaping up to be a busy one.

Someone has been spotted over the railings of the new bridge,

and then has disappeared. The police think they've jumped.

We had a pager call to say there was a 01 off the new bridge,

which means there's somebody, they think, in the water here.

Passerby seen him one minute and then when he looked back he was gone completely.

We have to assume at the moment that he's in the water here somewhere.

It's not been confirmed, we're not sure,

it's quite vague at the minute, but obviously, you know,

time is of the essence to try and find, if we can, anybody.

The man's family arrive to confirm to the police that he is missing.

Things are looking serious.

Occasionally when we've been called here in the dark,

we have actually got people in the water when it was dark.

But it's very much pot luck with it. It's not an exact science.

The new bridge, with its approaches, is over half a mile long

and runs over both land and river.

While the police try to fix a location on where they think the man jumped from the top of the bridge,

the lads keep scouring the water below.

Stephen, do we not think he hit the water?

Do we not think he's in the water, Stephen?

-They don't think he's hit water.

-They don't?

No. They think he might be on land, so we have to get out and look.

They may have got this guy on land over here now, it's not confirmed at the minute,

so we're standing by to get some further information here.

It seems if he has jumped, he may have missed the water and landed on the ground, unfortunately.

'Stand down now, over.'

Roger that.

We've been stood down here now.

Now the shout is over, the lads can reflect on how

they should be spending their Friday night.

I was actually just starting to cook tea for the family.

Just dropped everything, just turned the cooker off, just run.

Sean is missing out on a family occasion which can't be repeated.

Getting ready to go to a Christening,

supposed to be meeting at seven, but that's gone now.

A police car was going over the bridge and seen a fella

along the railings. By the time they came back round he was gone.

And then two family members then showed up to say that

a person was missing. It's a person we actually dealt with before.

'Aye, roger, stand down now, that's been confirmed that the jumper...'

We've been updated from the police that the guy was

over the railings, and had made his way back onto the right side

of the railings again, and ran off the end of the bridge.

And he's since been located at his home, but at the time you have to

take it at its worst case scenario, that there could be someone

in the water, which is why we got on the water as quickly as we did there.

But, fortunately, it's a good result for us, because the guy is alive and well and at home.

Not all call outs are false alarms.

And the team's lightning reactions can make the difference between life and death.

A woman in her 20s has jumped from the Craigavon Bridge.

Responded to the pager sent tonight, we got word that there was

a person in the water at the Craigavon Bridge,

that the person was actually just on the steel work, just on the bridge

and some guy who had been walking across the bridge at the time she jumped

had gone down and got hold of her and was holding onto her.

We believe that she had actually jumped from the steps,

so quite a fall.

It's quite cold, so she's fortunate that somebody did see her

going in because, you know, if the guy hadn't seen her going in,

God knows what the outcome would have been.

He was very courageous in what he did, like he held her there until we got there.

I was walking under the bridge and I seen a girl just throw herself

off the steps into the water.

I just remember the splash.

And her going down under the water.

I left my guitar and went down underneath the bridge.

And she clung on to the steel thing and I went down and grabbed her

and got her up onto the steel that's underneath there.

You know, from when we got the pager call through to actually

coming here and got her back to the ambulance, we were talking 10-15 minutes,

which is, you know, ideal, that's the way we like it.

Thank God, you know, that's another life saved

and I'm just glad that, you know, she can get the help now that she needs.

I wouldn't call myself a hero, no.

It was just spur of the moment thing, just one of them things.

Christmas celebrations are in full swing on the streets

and in the bars of Derry.

# Rocking around the Christmas tree

# At the Christmas party hop

# Mistletoe hung where you can see

# Every couple tries to stop... #

But for some, it's a period of uncertainty and stress.

There's something that really hits me is how we all go around telling people

Happy Christmas. It's something I don't say, I've stopped saying it a long, long time ago,

because we don't know what's going on in someone's life.

And happiness could be the least that they're experiencing

at that particular time. Of all the significant dates that go on for families,

the Christmas one is the one that every family who has lost someone

to suicide is experiencing intense pain at that particular time.

You all right, how's it going?

The Haribo crew are back on for one of the last shifts before Christmas.

How's it going? All right?

Oh. What happened to Haribo?

There was a deal on in Tesco's, I'm afraid, so the wife got me them.

All right, so Thursday night duty has come down to price now, has it?

They've had enough volunteers turn up to put out a foot patrol as well.

Helena is putting in a shift.

-Hi.

-You good?

Grand.

Suicide doesn't discriminate.

It doesn't discriminate between age, creed, religion.

It doesn't discriminate. It affects everybody and I would say there's

a lot of families in the town has been affected by it.

And it can happen to anyone, that's the scary thing.

Further up the river, the jeep team are parked by the Craigavon Bridge.

So tonight has been relatively quiet, to be honest.

It's been fine, there hasn't been any major incidents.

You used the "quiet" word.

-I was looking for you to say that.

-Not allowed to use the "quiet" word.

There's no other substitute!

The quiet word's a jinx.

It's a jinx.

Perhaps Garvin shouldn't have used the quiet word.

There is something unsettling

about the behaviour of a man on the bridge.

We're going to watch this man, he's stopped there for a period of time.

Now he's leaning there. He could be drunk.

He seems to be having a smoke.

He does seem to be having a smoke. There is possible smoke, so he could just be honestly having a smoke,

but it's the fact that he's stationary that concerned us.

The jeep team decide to leave nothing to chance.

That potential client is around 80 yards from Whisky Bravo

and he's on Tango Delta, over.

'OK, go on the site.'

Yes, we're on Tango Delta here, he seems to be moving rather slowly.

We'll keep away, over.

As a precaution, they call in the boat team to patrol

the waters below.

'Approaching the left, over.'

Message received, over.

We obviously don't want to aggravate him in any way because he is

intoxicated, but we won't approach unless we feel that we have to.

Suddenly the man makes a move for the railings.

'Go ahead.'

-How's it going, you all right there?

-Aye, I'm grand, aye.

Do you want to take a wee step away from the railings there?

-Why don't you take a wee step away from the railings?

-Why?

Because we've just seen you trying to get up there.

-No.

-Aye, you were putting your foot up there.

Let's see you take a wee step over here for us.

The team's first priority is to get him off the bridge voluntarily,

to put him out of harm's way.

And then to offer a listening ear.

He actually climbed up on the railings and that's

when we intervened.

He has a family relative that has went in before around

this time of year, so we would get a few people like that there, who've

obviously had a bereavement in the family, through suicide

and at this time of year, it's not easy for them.

And he was intending to go in tonight,

so it's a happy outcome for us.

The police drive the man to hospital.

Two big driving factors that can go along with the emotions that

are associated around a bereavement by suicide are shame and guilt.

We do know that people who have lost someone to suicide,

the pain can be so intense for them that they think,

"I can't cope with this any longer, I'd be better off dead."

Any one of us at any time can have suicidal thoughts,

and I remember being asked one time by a journalist who asked,

"What does someone look like who takes their life?"

And I said, "Take a look in the mirror,

"that's who takes their life, it's you or I."

The jeep team might have succeeded in preventing one person

going in the river, but the foot patrol has found

a troubling clue that they might be too late for someone else.

Danny's eagle eyes there actually spotted a pair of plimsolls,

just randomly sitting on the wall,

just nice and neat beside each other.

In their experience,

people taking their own lives often take their shoes off before jumping.

It's serious enough to get Craig from home.

Just sitting beside each other over on that wall just there.

If anybody comes up missing now to the police in the next 24 hours,

there's a good chance that they could have been somebody who's

went in off here.

Earlier on in the year,

the same thing happened just on down the quay.

There was a baseball hat and a pair of trainers left,

and then it turned out that there was a man that entered

the river in the middle of the night.

Seven years ago, Phonsie McDermott's son, Adrian,

was lost to the river from the New Bridge.

Like the current missing lad, Eamonn,

Adrian was a young man, just 17 years old.

A nephew of mine had told me that he had found Adrian's slipper over

the top of the bridge. Adrian text his girlfriend and his best friend

to say that he had to go, he had to die, and that was it,

that's all the message ever was, or it was all we had ever knew before it or after it.

Adrian said he was going out that night for a party,

that he was going up the town, which he never did,

he always just went out around his friend's houses.

He never came back.

He left as happy as Larry, but we were at a party in Letterkenny and

I left my phone in the car and Lisa left her phone in the car and when

we came back out to the car again there was 16 messages on our phone.

The first thing we knew was Adrian was supposed to have gone to

the New Bridge, so we drove straight from Letterkenny to

the New Bridge and we met Foyle Search and Rescue, and the police.

Every time you look out you see these memories of

when we were out there searching

and walking about and searching for phone, searching for wee clues.

There's never even a time that you drive over the bridge,

or look into this river, but you'll think on Adrian, like,

because this river surrounds Derry and you can't get away from it,

no matter where you go, it surrounds you.

We searched for 16 days,

so you're always going to have that memory, you'll never lose that.

That's one thing you'll never lose, is the memory of the water.

I haven't slept right for years, so I haven't, since that.

You lost your whole pattern of life.

This is the first car that he ever built.

This is before, when he was at National School, that we

had a hot rod up to when we first started racing

and it was number 88.

It had spoilers on, so he decided he'd make one at school.

He put an elastic band on from here to here and you birled the wheels

and you let it down, the car went. So wasn't bad for that age, was it?

Mad about stock cars and since an early age, like myself,

from no age driving stock cars.

We have our own track up in Manorcunningham,

the DDT Raceways, he raced the juniors up there,

when he was going to make it big... He's not here now.

You always think that your children should be burying you

instead of you burying them,

but in this case, it's the other way about.

You get the memories of why he shouldn't be in there that age, like.

What he would have been like now, you know,

he'd have been a man now, 23 years old, like, you know.

And he should be coming to visit me instead of me coming to visit him,

that's the way I look at it.

But that's life.

It's what the person leaves behind, all their family,

the people who cares about them they left behind,

we still have to go through this every day in the week,

which they don't now, and that's what makes me angry.

There is nothing in this world that can't be sorted,

there's nothing you've done.

I don't care what you've done, if you come and talk about it,

it can be sorted out, one way or another.

Craig was one of the team that recovered Adrian's body.

If Foyle Search and Rescue do find a body,

they take it to their secluded garage on the banks of the river.

Body recovery is scary, it's eerie,

it's one of the weirdest sensations that you ever come across, like,

you know, you don't want to see what you're going to go and see.

I hate down here now. You just think of all of the bodies that

you've recovered down here and all that and then...

If a rattle to the tin comes you could nearly run a mile!

I actually think there's someone outside there, just...

Spooky.

No. Sorry!

Thought I heard a vehicle there.

Oh, you put it to the back of your mind,

you couldn't cope with it, if you started to think about all the people that you've seen and all the sights.

I'm not saying that it doesn't happen, like,

maybe you've seen them again, or you're dreaming and...

I think one of the guys,

the first people that I had ever got, I sort of knew him, like.

So him wearing Dr Marten boots and the laces was open...

I'm dreaming a couple of times and him actually still being here,

lying here and him saying to me, "For fuck's sake, go on, tie my boots,"

you know, that's something that's just stuck with me over the years, it's still with me.

You try and put it the back of your mind.

It's Christmas Eve.

The pager team are on call to deal with any incidents.

Sean prepares to go out for one last search,

while his wife, Mary, starts preparations for the big day.

When Sean was asked to join the pager crew,

he didn't accept until he came and talked to me and the kids and...

I was just...

I thought it was a lovely thing to give back

and I knew Sean would be good at it and dedicated.

I couldn't function on pager without the backing of my wife.

You know, it does encroach on your family life.

It comes first, to be honest with you, and the kids all know that.

Life, if somebody has a problem or something has happened,

then that's...nothing else more important than that, you know.

We all want Sean just to go, we make it as easy as possible to get

him out, open doors and whatever and get car keys and he's gone, you know.

That's me away now.

You're off.

'What started out as a once-an-evening job

'has become much, much more.'

-Bye, love.

-Bye.

'I'm in my fourth year now with Foyle Search.

'It does become engrossing, for want of a better word maybe,

'because the more you do, the more you want to do.'

I have four kids of my own, ranging from 19 to 29, and if this was

one of my kids I would be absolutely up the walls about the whole thing.

And that's the sort of slant I have on it,

that if this was one of my kids here, you know,

I'd be wanting to do everything and everything that I could.

So, we'll get down and we'll do our thing

and if we get a result today it'll be a huge Christmas present

for me and for all the guys, to get a bit of closure for the family.

When they get to the quayside, Eamonn's father and family

have laid on a surprise for them.

Where's the turkey and ham?

All right, then!

LAUGHTER

Well, normally Eamonn,, that's the father of the youngster,

he makes soup and stuff and we're sort of slagging him

about getting turkey and stuff like that because it's Christmas Eve now.

I tell you what, boys, if anybody's out tomorrow, there'll be divorce papers!

We'll be all out!

LAUGHTER

I mean, through all the sadness it's sort of a bit of a distraction,

a bit of break to us, really.

The friends of the family, they're going to go out tomorrow, which is Christmas day,

and then we'll go back out then on Boxing Day.

Turn your radio up there, Paddy.

# It'll be lonely this Christmas

# Without you to hold

# It'll be lonely this Christmas

# Lonely and cold

# It'll be cold, so cold

# Without you to hold

# This Christmas

# This Christmas. #

It's now six weeks since Eamonn disappeared.

Phonsie McDermott has some sense of what Eamonn's family must be

going through.

They'll not be sleeping, they'll not be thinking right, they'll not be eating.

Everything's going through their mind - why, where, when?

It's grieving, but it takes a lot of time.

You'll never get over it, or you'll never forget it,

but you'll get easier to work with it.

At the end of the day, if their loved one is in this river,

Foyle Search and Rescue will definitely get it,

because they have never lost a body here yet.

The Moore family are still scouring the banks of the river

for Eamonn's body.

I suppose there's a bit of frustration there that we

can't get him, you know. It's not knowing where...

And you don't know how long this is going to go on, to be fair, you know.

We don't feel we can move on until we get his body,

so everything's focused on that.

I don't think we've had a chance to even grieve properly yet.

We're not even at the grieving stage, I think, we're just

so focused on the goal of getting his body back, like that's all.

We wake up every morning and we go out searching on the Foyle.

I've fished this river all my life and I thought I knew it.

It's like Groundhog Day, it was the same thing every day,

you're coming down, you're searching for him,

that's all you can do, you know, and pray, like.

The whole of Derry is praying for him.

Places where you've searched,

I know he's not there because obviously every day,

you know, you search and the tide's gone out and you're just left

with rocks and stones and everything else, so he's not there.

So it has me sort of confused - where is he?

I've gone from the Peace Bridge!

I'm only joking.

We get a lot of people like that.

Saying they're going to jump and they're just having a laugh.

It's New Year's Eve.

The run up has been relatively quiet,

but Foyle Search and Rescue are out in force for the big night.

It's New Year's Eve, it's brilliant,

there's loads of crowds. It's really, really good on New Year's Eve.

The majority of people come out of the clubs

and they will get home safely, thank God, and have no major issues.

You get the odd straggler, maybe this is the clients that we

come across sometimes, who leave the clubs or pubs

and are maybe a bit down in the mouth or depressed, or whatever.

Of the complex cocktail of factors that can tip someone towards

self harm, alcohol is one.

Going to be sick? You're all right.

'There are some people that would say that'

suicides are impulsive.

And it would be foolish to say that impulsive suicides don't exist,

they do exist.

However, I would argue that a lot of those impulsive suicides, people

tend to be under the influence of alcohol, or some other drug.

If a person has a stresser in their life and as a result of

that stresser they misuse alcohol or some other drug,

and they then have access to method, that's a very dangerous scenario.

A lot of people who something is going on in their lives,

they're in the bars in town,

most of our bars are very accessible towards the river.

DANCE MUSIC

While the town celebrates 2012 in the clubs and bars...

ALL: Five, four, three....

..the Foyle Search and Rescue team see in New Year in a car park.

-Happy New Year.

-Happy New Year, Sean.

Happy New Year to you, have a good one.

Happy New Year!

Great work.

Good evening, Happy New Near to you.

Happy New Year, guys.

Thank you very much.

Sean spots someone who's seeing in the New Year alone.

Her behaviour is making him uneasy.

Just going to pull in here a minute, to keep an eye on this girl

because if she heads up on to the Peace Bridge I'm going to get

the boat to come down and just see her off the other side.

I can't figure where this lass has went because she hasn't passed.

Can anybody see her there?

At the railings?

Why don't we just go there?

Foyle Boat, that girl has gone on to the Peace Bridge there, maybe you'd

keep an eye on her and see her off the end of the bridge there, over.

She seems a bit distressed

and possibly crying earlier on there, so just keep an eye on her.

Foyle Boat. That girl has stopped

at the railings there, do you see her, over?

-She's stopped here.

-This girl we were keeping an eye on has now

stopped on the Peace Bridge here, so we're going to go over

and have a word with her and see what's what.

She seems very distressed

and crying. So now at the moment, the team is with her

trying to suss out what's going on.

Are you OK, love?

You just feel bad?

How long have you felt like this?

Come on. You'll be all right, we're here to help you.

How long have you felt like this?

CRYING

Months? Any particular reason?

And there's people that will help you through this here.

Have you spoke to any of your family about it? You don't want to?

Feeling suicidal?

Are we the first person you've admitted this to?

Ever? Oh, well, that's a massive step for you, already.

Tell me this, what do you think your mum and dad would say tonight

if I rang up and said that I have your daughter on the bridge

here, how do you think they'd feel?

Come on, we'll get you out of here.

Come on, it'll be OK.

I spent the past five weeks on the river searching for

a young lad of 21 who's in the river.

And I have to face his dad every day and his uncle,

every day from nine in the morning, until nine at night.

Would you honestly want to put your family through that?

The team drive her home.

It's three in the morning, the volunteers call it a night.

That's why you come out on New Year's Eve,

you help somebody that, if we hadn't been there tonight,

it could have ended very badly

and you do come away feeling,

that, all right, you haven't solved her problems,

but you've given her another day to deal with it, you know,

so she can start again tomorrow and hopefully start a good 2012, better

than it was going to be tonight, so it could have ended badly.

It's hard for people, the general public, to realise sometimes what's happening beside them,

This girl was standing on the railings right beside people and they were walking past her.

But that's human nature, people don't want to interfere with other people's affairs,

it's quite common.

And that's why we're there.

We see the tell tale signs and that's what we pick up on,

and that's hopefully where we get intervention and prevention from going in the water.

Goodnight, everybody.

Their final act of the period is to gather all the volunteers

for a search, co-ordinated with the police, for Eamonn.

Well, the tide has raised. There's a possibility

the body could be left, you need to get in there and check it.

A really good search and that way then

we can go back to the family and say, look, he's not lying out.

Just having his body and being able to have a funeral, it'll make us

feel a lot better and I think we can only move on once we've had that.

Until we have his body we can't move on, we're stuck in this limbo.

If we hadn't got Foyle Search and Rescue

we basically would have nobody else to turn to.

I go to Mass on Sunday and I...

I pray a lot and there's a few names added to my people I pray for,

that's the lads at Foyle Search and Rescue.

The thing is people wear masks all the time.

We all do it.

But people who are having thoughts of suicide can wear

even bigger masks.

Men, in particular, are pretty good at wearing a mask

because we've grown up in a culture where big boys don't cry.

People think there's no way out and there is a way out of everything.

It's only a matter of talking to somebody, you know and...

I know people are different, you know,

people are deep and some people like to keep things to themselves,

but that's not the answer, you know.

You've got to get it out, you've got to get somebody to talk to,

go to a counsellor or talk to a family member, or somebody,

you know, that they think that they can trust, that they can talk to.

I mean, do it, I mean, you know, killing yourself is not the answer.

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