Manchester Arena Inquiry: Officer 'frustrated' by lack of paramedics

A police officer who was among the first on the scene of the Manchester Arena bombing said he was left feeling "frustrated" at the lack of paramedics.

Sgt Matthew Martin, from British Transport Police, told the inquiry into the 2017 attack how he gave first aid to some of the casualties.

The inquiry has previously heard how only one paramedic entered the scene in the first 40 minutes after the bomb.

Twenty-two people were killed and hundreds more injured in the attack.

Sgt Martin told the inquiry he helped carry casualties away from the bomb scene using makeshift stretchers including crowd control barriers and advertising hoardings.

He said he "could have used proper stretchers to move people out of the area" if the ambulances had arrived.

Sgt Martin also told the inquiry he and his colleagues did not have the appropriate first-aid equipment or knowledge to properly help those seriously injured.

"Certainly I felt the best people in that situation would have been medical experts, paramedics…it felt like a while before there were any paramedics in the City Rooms," he said.

The hearing was told how Sgt Martin used police issue Velcro leg restraints as an improvised tourniquet to try to stop a casualty bleeding.

Around 15 minutes after the explosion, Sgt Martin asked North West Ambulance Service paramedic Patrick Ennis about the whereabouts of the ambulances and other paramedics.

He said he was told "they're on route, they're on the way."

Sgt Martin, who was a PC at the time of the attack, said there did not appear to be a designated person in charge of the emergency response in the immediate aftermath.

He told the inquiry that he and other responders at the arena were doing the best they could to help but he accepted they were not working to a plan by an on-scene commander.

The inquiry chairman Sir John Saunders told Sgt Martin "there was a great deal of heroism shown by you and other officers in doing what you did".

The inquiry continues.

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