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By DAN CARRIER
 

Above: Hampstead-based trainee police officer PC Claire Moffett gets her award from Sir Ian Blair, and below, PC Ian Miller

Rookie cops win Met's highest award

ROOKIE Camden coppers who were first on the scene of the July 7 bombs were among officers who received the Metropolitan Police’s highest awards.
They were among an unprecedented total of 34 Camden officers who were given accolades by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair for dealing with the horrific scenes that greeted them on the morning of the terror attacks.
Holborn-based PC Ashley Walker was the first police officer at the scene of the Number 30 bus blast in Tavistock Square. He had been on patrol when the bomb went off. He said: “I was about 100 metres away from the bus and heard a huge bang. I saw metal sheets from the bus fly into the air along with other debris and my first instinct was to run onto the bus to help the people hurt and injured. I carried people off to safety and gave first aid to several people.”
Sgt. Graham Cross, who had been a police officer for 12 years and had served as a soldier in the first Gulf War, joined PC Walker at Tavistock Square moments after the bomb had exploded.
He said: “It seems that we were in the wrong place at the right time. I was worried there would be another bomber on the bus but we just had to get there and help people off. Any Police Officer would have done the same in those harrowing circumstances.”
PCs Ian Miller and James Cope were on the Piccadilly line platform at King’s Cross Station within minutes of the blast, which claimed half of the 52 victims of the terror attack.
They braved the dark and smokey tunnel, risking injury from a possible second explosion, electrocution or the tunnel’s collapse, to rescue and give first aid to casualties.
On Wednesday they were awarded Commissioner’s Commendations for their “supreme courage, outstanding professionalism, dedication to duty and compassion” at the police training headquarters in Hendon.
Hampstead-based trainee police officers PC Claire Moffett and PC Phillipa Mason, who had only been in the job for five weeks, were two of the first officers to reach King’s Cross.
PC Moffett said: “We heard reports of smoke at King’s Cross so we rushed down there. We didn’t know what to expect but we knew it was bad.”
They discovered a scene of carnage.
PC Mason, who arrived at Russell Square, said she could not believe the scene that greeted her.
She said: “The lights were out and there was smoke every where.
“We found injured people on the platform and the train had been obliterated.”
Other officers honoured included Inspector David Nasmyth-Miller, who helped run the King’s Cross operation, and PCs Vivek Shrotri, Neil Cook, Katharine Brine, Anna Bearman, Jonathan Herd, Richard Harwin, Stephanie Barron and Simon Ramasawmy and Sergeant David Timms, who all entered the tunnel to give first aid.
Trainee PCs Mark Patchett, Peter Singer, Phillippa Mason, Karen Miles-Holdaway Helen Skeggs, Claire Moffet and their instructors Paul Brown, Lee Gibbs, Ryan Marlborough, Louise Berry and Neil Drinkwater were all similarly honoured.
Commissioner’s Commendations are awarded when officers display “a high degree of bravery above that which would normally be expected” or where they “perform their duty in an outstanding manner far above that which would normally be expected for their rank, role, responsibility training and/or experience”.
Speaking at the ceremony, Commissioner Sir Ian Blair said: “This is the largest number of people that have ever been commended in one day in the history of the Met.”
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