The helicopter itself had come down just below the Col, on boggy ground, and the wreckage was fairly intact, apart from splinters of metal that had shot away from the main body on impact, and during the ensuing explosion. The main fuselage was burning, but in one piece. It was impossible to tell how many runners were underneath the machine and its blades, which, as the bird came down, ripped up the bog and took bodies with them.

Suddenly, the sound of voices calling 999 pierced the eerie quiet.

Glynn raced back down the route and was on the Col in a couple of minutes. The mist clung to him and his skin glistened with sweat. Others joined him and he quickly took charge. He assessed victims and spotted those who were still alive. Some of them barely clung to life; they were the ones he began working on. He ripped off his shirt and made crude tourniquets, tying them around the ragged remnants of limbs, attempting to stem blood loss. Other runners watched him and did the same, but some couldn’t move for fear. Their brains had shut down in horror. Some people tried to treat the dead and Glynn ignored them.

‘I’m a medic!’ he heard someone shout through the cloud that was rising and falling as if taunting their efforts.