July 7: the anxiety of giving evidence

Tim Coulson was travelling to the launch of a teacher training event on the morning of July 7.

He was on a tube train passing the one which exploded near Edgware Road. He has told Channel 4 News about the horror of what he heard, saw and felt as well as the anxiety of giving evidence to the inquests.

The explosion

There was a great amount of light. I don’t particularly perceive a memory of the colour of that light but it was a very short millisecond amount of light. I now know it came from the train passing.

More importantly for me was the sound of the explosion. It’s one of the loudest sounds that I hope I ever hear.

I’m sure that it’s not something people normally in close proximity would be expecting to hear. It did affect all of us with temporary hearing loss, as far as I know no one has permanent hearing loss.

The very initial first feeling was a physical one to check if I had arms and legs.

My mind had gone into a state of what an earth was that, am I still alive. It’s still a very real anxiety that was there and lives with me.

I made a decision and I think that decision wasn’t based on what we expect normally. You make decisions based on evidence around you, it may be based on a fright or flight syndrome, there’s all manner of things that could be analysed.

My mind had gone into a state of “what an earth was that, am I still alive?”

The decision I made was that I had to help with what I could hear. What I could immediately hear was the cries of human suffering at such a level that that’s what propelled me into wanting to relieve them in the best way I could.

I had no preconceived idea as to how an earth I was going to do that. That led to subsequently breaking a window to get out with the help of two other people who had a similar intent to keep as many people in health and comfort as we could.

The decision to climb out of the train was not thankfully clouded by the realities.

What should have happened is I shouldn’t have done it. Breaking a glass window is difficult, it leads to cuts and damage to someone else, possibly myself.

Also I had no conscious thought about whether electricity was flowing through those lines. To climb out between two stationary tube lines was a bit of a daft thing to do you might say, but such was my intent to help people who I could now see or hear and who were in a very poor state of health.

There were dead people, there were broken people and there were people in great need of help

All of your senses are absolutely heightened at that point and I think it is relevant to mention that the caustic smell was unusual but it was all outweighed not by what I could see but I think the greatest emotion was what I could hear.

There was the cry of one passenger requesting “help me, help me” over the tone of that was someone else saying in a repetitious, shocked way to “stay with us, stay with us” and I was also aware there was someone at my feet saying “mind where you’re walking”.

There’s an expression that things are burned into the memory and unlike video and CDs and DVDs you can’t overwrite your memory completely. What you find is that it’s still there, it’s as live in my mind’s eye today as it was on that occasion often heightened by these inquests.

It was a scene of carnage, there were dead people, there were broken people and there were people in great need of help.

Helping Stan

I focussed on a man – the bottom half of his body I couldn’t see. He had no clothing on I do remember thinking how unusual that was. I knew it was a warm day but it was just the sheer force of the blast had blown the clothes off his body.

The man I now know as Stan was in a poor state of health. He was staring straight ahead, he had no facial expression whatsoever but his eyes moved.

This man had a soul, he had life through the amazing expression in those eyes.

What I called to mind at that point was that the eyes are the window of the soul. This man had a soul, he had life through the amazing expression in those eyes.

I told him who I was, that I had basic first aid and could I check his injuries.

I poured some water into a cap and tipped it into Stan’s throat. The reason I did that was because I recalled if someone has a gagging reaction, which they usually do when someone pours something into your throat you don’t expect, that means they have a healthy sign of life.

If there isn’t one you become…you become immediately aware that their life will end fairly soon.

There was no such reaction in Stan.

I carried on talking to him, I would like to say I comforted him by being there but I have no way of knowing.

He died fairly swiftly within a short period of time.

At that point his eyes were staring so I closed Stan’s eyes because I truly felt, and still do, that he’d finished with this world and he really shouldn’t be looking at it anymore.

As I did so I said a prayer for him because if he was a man of faith or not that I hoped he had a safe journey to wherever it was that he believed in, if there was another world that he went safely there.

Helping Alison

Then I was aware behind me, right next to the tunnel wall was a female.

Alison was an Australian who was recovering after being blasted out of her set of doors which were further down from where Stan had been, hit the tunnel wall and was knocked unconscious.

She was returning to consciousness. I again did the same kind of introduction as to who I was and checking her for injuries.

I noticed a very damaged left eye which was swelling with the most unusual colours and I was just thinking that’s not good.

Her right leg was certainly the wrong shape, I’ve always called it that. It wouldn’t have functioned as a leg if it had been left in that position.

She was very nervous, quite frightened she held onto my right hand.

She asked me to stay with her and I had no hesitation in saying I would until I’m told otherwise and I absolutely 100 per cent meant that hoping it would be possible.

Part of my drive and determination within that was an arrogance that said I’ve had one person die in my hands I’m not going to have any more.

That might sound ridiculous and of course in some ways it was.

A passer-by helped lift her back into the carriage with me and then he went away and we spent quite a period of time in probably the most bizarre conversation we’ll ever have, either of us.

Mine included a lot of lying. The inquest is looking at truth but the lying I did was harmless. It was “of course they’re coming, of course they’ll find us, no I don’t think there’ll be anything else”.

A unique bond

I have a unique bond with Alison – there’s not another one like it that I’ve ever known.

There isn’t a word – we’ve both tried to find a word that says what kind of bond it is – it’s just unique.

We use email and Skype to communicate.

She made me very upset, just as an emotion very tearful, when she wrote a supportive statement for an award I’ve been given.

She ended it by saying: “Tim is the bravest man I’ve ever known”. It still kind of makes me a bit tearful really. I could joke and say she clearly didn’t know many people but that isn’t true. It’s a really lovely thing to say about someone else, isn’t it.

The inquests

Initially just before inquest began I had a rise in anxiety levels about knowing it was coming.

Knowing the pattern of provision that Aldgate would be first but Edgware Road would be close behind so it was likely to come in early November.

It raised my anxiety to the extent that I returned to my GP to seek the best plan of support which has been to up my medication to allow me to rest and get tranquil sleep. Not exactly 100 per cent successful.

In hearing the presentations of others at the inquests – I have a huge amount of understanding for what they went through, similarly to me and far worse to what I went through.

The descriptions that are so vital for this inquest are what happened to whom, and how were they at the time of their death. A very difficult scenario to re-live without it damaging you.

What I personally want to gain from the inquests is for all the families so they can rest more comfortably with their anxieties and their pain that it can assist and reduce that.

I would like the inquests to give me, and it almost makes me selfish to have to ask for it, some more peace of mind, far less restless nights and an opportunity to continue to enjoy the world I do enjoy but I want to get back to more complete relaxation.

It’s quite painful. I can’t attach a number or a letter but if we were to use letters and A was the worst and Z was the best then it’s probably hovering around a C or a D at the moment.

I hope that what will come from my ability to give that evidence and for conclusions to be drawn that I’ll feel better.

A senior psychologist that worked with me for 40 weeks said “Tim, you’ll be waiting for about 10 years for the pain to even begin to subside so don’t be in a hurry”.

She was right.