02/12/2013 Newsnight Scotland

while. The time will come when the old rules will have to be relaxed -

and that'll be the point of maximum danger for the old Marxist-Leninist

system. Newsnight Scotland: Nine people are

confirmed dead in a tragic accident, including three who is very job was

to protect the public. What is needed to help the bereaved, the

survivors and the whole community come to terms with this event? We'll

hear from the medical profession, the faith community and the police

service. Good evening. Almost exactly three

days ago a nightmarish tragedy hit central Glasgow. Nine families were

bereaved and dozens of individuals were injured, in spite of heroic

efforts by amateur and professional rescuers. By this evening the dust

has settled, literally. While the professionals concentrate on solving

the technical mystery of why this helicopter crashed, those directly

affected - and many more of us - face coming to terms with the

aftermath of a traumatic event. First tonight, Suzanne Allan

reports. This morning, just before 10:30am,

another grim task began. The helicopter that caused such

devastation, such tragedy, was winched out of the rubble. This has

been a painstaking, thorough operation. At stake - the safety of

the rescue workers and the dignity of the dead. Rescue workers,

survivors and the public stood in quiet contemplation. For some who

made it out of the Clutha last Friday, it was too much. Shocking.

Er, I don't believe we've walked out. We're walking wounded but we're

alive and we're here to tell the story. Some aren't so lucky and my

heart just goes out to all their families and the people that haven't

got any closure on it yet. We were standing chatting away and it was

just a huge bang and I looked round to my right and Nancy wasn't there.

I was aware that the whole pub seemed to be on top of us. A man had

been blown on top of me and blew me into a corner. Pushed me into the

corner. I kept thinking it was a bomb. And then there was silence. As

the bodies of victims were driven away, emergency workers formed a

guard of honour. This task has been hard enough for Police Scotland but

is all the more poignant because two of the dead are their own. A local

resident, the Archbishop of Glasgow, visited the scene today and was

visibly shocked. To see that helicopter being prepared for

removal is astonishing and I'm a wee bit shaken, to tell you the truth.

I'm quite upset. I live not far from here. This is my end of town and so

that's a very familiar place. I'm so pleased and so gratified that so

many Glaswegians showed the real spirit of Glasgow and that gives you

a real hope for the future. Similarly, the owner of the pub is

still in disbelief. The pub, the building means nothing. That'll get

sorted, whatever it takes to sort it. The important thing to think

about just now is the people who were there, the staff, the

customers, the band - everyone who was involved. That's the most

important thing just now, what we can do to help them. This has sat on

the whole city, from the emergency services to the sporting fraternity,

from religious leaders to the people of Glasgow. A book of condolence was

opened at the city Chambers today. But now the task of finding answers

begins. From the sky, you can see the scale of the challenge that

faced the emergency services. This building, once a tenement, has an

unusual construction. Three layers of roof and walls one metre thick.

Eyewitnesses tell of the helicopter dropping like a stone. Air accident

eight as were on the scene by 9:15am on the morning of the crash. Today

we got a few details. I can confirm that the helicopter does not have a

black box recorder, however it does have a significant number of modern

electronic systems on board and it may be possible to recover recorded

data from those systems. I can confirm that nothing detached from

the helicopter in-flight before the accident and that all four rotor

blades were attached to the road ahead after the impact. This is what

we know for sure but one aviation expert offers this opinion. There

was no black box on board. Air-traffic data will give them some

information about how the radar could see the helicopter. There is a

possibility of a fuel supply problem but the eyewitness reports say the

helicopter was spinning out of control, rather than just descending

rapidly, which would tend to point towards the tail rotor. Much has

been made of the heroism of the passing public - the tireless

dedication of the fire, police and ambient screws and their quick

response. This is a city in morning but it is one where people stand

shoulder to shoulder and hope that it will smile again before long.

I'm joined now by Dr Anne Douglas, a clinical psychologist and former

Head of NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Trauma Service. The Reverend

Sally Foster Fulton is Chair of the Church of Scotland's Church and

Society Council. And Calum Steele is General Secretary of the Scottish

Police Federation. Good evening to all of you and thank you for coming.

It's almost like a ripple effect, isn't it? Those involved in this

trauma are clearly those worst affected but you can see the wider

society has been affected. I think a wide range of people have been

affected by this, from the people who were in the pub to the bereaved,

and then we're thinking about the front line responders. And also,

perhaps, people who have previously been in a major incident. So people

in a wide range across society will have been affected by this, and also

journalists. Because it's not just bereavement - we're talking about

real trauma because of the seriousness of what happened. Yes,

it is a major incident, a major trauma and completely out with

people's range of normal experience. People were going out for a casual

evening, relaxing, and something completely unpredictable happened.

It will take people a long time to try and make sense of this. To that

end, how do you go about offering words of comfort in a situation like

this, which, to many people, is inexplicable. It is inexplicable and

one of the things we have to hold to is that when a tragedy like this

happens, it's not about our particular beliefs but our shared in

common humanity. One thing they've groups can do is offer space for

people to gather together and grieve together, unpack their feelings

together, ask questions together. To offer that unconditional space is

something that communities can do and to stand alongside people, not

answering their questions but standing alongside them when they

ask why. Police have to deal with this kind of trauma and all

emergency workers do, almost on a daily basis, but these are unique

circumstances and you lost two of your colleagues, so very difficult

for those emergency workers to deal with? It's not uncommon at all for

emergency services personnel to deal with tragedy. It's what we do on an

almost daily basis but there is something very different when it

does involve members of your own family and when it comes to the

police service, we consider ourselves the biggest family in

Scotland. In fact, the messages of support we've had from colleagues

across the world suggest that the police considers itself the biggest

family in the world because the loss has been felt very sorely, not just

in Scotland but by our friends in all corners of the UK and, indeed,

the wider world. Do you think that sense of shared experience will help

some people through this? May be those who will not find solace in

religion but that there is a coming together, sometimes in churches but

not always? Definitely, and sometimes in the hardest times for

human beings, the best of humanity comes out. To watch what happened in

the aftermath of that tragedy, people going towards the tragedy

rather than going away from it, trying to do whatever they could to

help... The first responses were, how can we stand alongside folk?

That's for people with religious faith and those with no faith. We're

all in this together. When we look at what happened here, are there

stages of bereavement that people have to go through? It would be

helpful to distinguish people who are traumatised but not bereaved and

people who are but read but not traumatised. If we could take people

who are traumatised, we can expect the vast majority of people to

recover from the trauma. People are incredibly resilient and although it

would be quite usual for people to have, perhaps, nightmares and be

jumpy and worried and having difficulty sleeping, normally that

would settle down after a few weeks. Clearly, for people who are

per read a much longer process -- bereaved, it's a much longer

process. They have to deal first with the shock of the trauma before

normal bereavement can start. If people are genuinely traumatised by

this, how is that picked up in terms of them getting some help? Are GPs

normally the first line of defence? I would say the first line of

defence are friends and family and colleagues. The coverage of

Glaswegians and how they've reached out to people has been the first

line of response, and the first line responders themselves. That's

tremendous helpful. Friends and family. And if people feel that

things aren't settling down to them after maybe three weeks or a month,

that is the time to seek professional help. However, some

people may be immensely distressed early on a particularly those who

are socially isolated, and may need to seek help from their GP sooner.

What sort of help is available to those in the emergency services? Is

there an expectation that people will talk among themselves and that

will be helpful? One of the great things about the police force is

that we have great year to peer support. We almost all of out of

each other's pockets. Police officers often socialise after hours

and invariably talk about what we have experienced during the day. We

often say that we experience a job like no other and therefore

sometimes we can only speak about our experiences with our colleagues.

We have our own in house trained members of staff that are capable of

dealing with debriefing at the early-stage. That is a realisation

that however much trauma emergency workers have been through in the

past, they are not immune to needing help at some stage. For some,

talking is the worst thing you can do. It is the compound doing effect

that we have to be alert to because the injuries that are sustained eye,

for example, those involved in this incident might not manifest

themselves for three years, three months or 30 years. Even those

chaplains providing comfort, the Archbishop of Glasgow talking about

how shocked he was today, but also that have been others on the scene

since the accident happened, they are there to provide comfort but

potentially might need help themselves? Everybody is going to

come to terms with this in a different way. We have to remember a

brief is a process, but you can't go back to different stages. You have

to be in there with people for the long haul. This will on packet

itself for a long time to come. You need to be with people where they

are. We talk about the golden rule of doing to others what you would

like them to do for you. Some people will want to talk about this a lot

and others will not. You have to respect that. That should be

respected because people have different ways of coping. People

know what is best for themselves. We are incredibly lucky in Scotland to

have some specialist trauma services in the NHS in the central belt and

beyond. So there is help available for GPs and others. How much

experience has been taken from other tragedies such as the plastics

factory disaster from several years ago? As trauma experts, we are

constantly learning about what works and what does not. At one time,

people thought about psychological debriefing was a good thing. The

evidence now shows that that is not particularly helpful. We are always

learning about what works for people. People meet contact with

family and friends and not to be herded into a room to talk to

experts about what happened straightaway. There are no positives

in this, but it is interesting that the public might have a renewed

understanding of what the emergency services do. Incidents like this

really drive that home. We have taken comfort from how the community

has rallied around. And not just immediately but in the last few

days. For years, Glasgow will look back on a day of significant sadness

but can take enormous pride from the reaction to help everyone associated

with this. We have more sadness to come because there will be funeral

is to be held. People know from their own experiences of bereavement

that you are very much caught up in the aftermath and it can take a

while for the realisation to hit you. Absolutely. The media hype has

shown that there is a lot of attention, but the people who have

been bereaved will be left to get on with it. That is whether family and

communities step into continue the support and the outpouring of love

and support. As we move on, people need to be supported and cared for.

That is when family and community really come to the fore. What would

you say to someone watching who feel they might have been adversely

affect affected by what they have seen? This is a relatively rare

event. It shakes every one sense of security and stability. It is like

Lockerbie. People are worried about what might fall from the sky. This

is a rear event. Get whacked to business as usual. Children might be

frightened by this. Sometimes children are forgotten. We need to

get back to a normal routine as quickly as possible. For those

directly affected, we know the police have family liaison

officers, but what happens when the police move away? Are other agencies

brought in? We never just cut anyone loose. It is very important for

families to know that other agencies can come in to help. We work closely

with agencies to make sure that happens. My organisation, the

Scottish Police Federation, and my representatives, will help the

families of the deceased police officers for some time to come.

Answers will not come quickly. We will be dealing with these families

for many years to come. And it is right that we do so. A pilot and two

police officers have paid the ultimate sacrifice for doing

something they love and that is keeping other people safe. What

would your advice be for those who are traumatised by this? Turn to

your family and communities and let them know what you need. There are

layers of care in the village of Scotland. Reach out and let people

know that you are struggling. Now a quick look at tomorrow's front

pages. The Scotsman has the guard of honour. The Daily Mail has a picture

of the helicopter being lifted from the close. -- from the Clutha.

That's all from me. More news is always on BBC Scotland's website. We

are back with Good Morning Scotland on Radio Scotland tomorrow morning

at 6am.