Ibrox Disaster: Wishaw first aider reflects on tragedy 50 years on
Tom Donaldson was 21 when he travelled to Ibrox on January 2, 1971, as part of the Wishaw section of the St Andrew’s Ambulance Corps.
Stairway 13 in the aftermath of the tragedy
Get the stories that matter to you sent straight to your inbox with our daily newsletter.Invalid EmailSomething went wrong, please try again later.
Subscribe
When you subscribe we will use the information you provide to send you these newsletters. Sometimes they’ll include recommendations for other related newsletters or services we offer. OurPrivacy Noticeexplains more about how we use your data, and your rights. You can unsubscribe at any time.
THEY were just fans at a football match. Spectators at a game, a banal everyday occurrence. They were there to support their team, Rangers, but they never came home. Instead on Stairway 13 at Ibrox Park, they met with crushing death and injury. Even 50 years later the sheer unfairness of it makes you weep – no one should die for being a football spectator, no one should die in such a manner. Remember the 66. For the sake of our common humanity, remember the 66. I told last week of how the disaster unfolded, and now I will deal with the aftermath. It was the sight of the bodies laid out in lines on the turf of Ibrox Park that broke hearts all over Scotland and beyond. Only some grainy newspaper pictures survive to tell the tale, as there was no filming of what happened – a mercy, given what unfolded that cold, foggy evening in Glasgow.
Ibrox disaster: First aider Tom Donaldson looks back on Scottish tragedy
Tom was among the 60 St Andrew’s Ambulance Association first aiders who were in attendance
Tom Donaldson (Image: Wishaw Press)
Get the stories that matter to you sent straight to your inbox with our daily newsletter.Invalid EmailSomething went wrong, please try again later.
Subscribe
When you subscribe we will use the information you provide to send you these newsletters. Sometimes they’ll include recommendations for other related newsletters or services we offer. OurPrivacy Noticeexplains more about how we use your data, and your rights. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Tom Donaldson has spoken about the Ibrox Disaster, in which 66 fans lost their lives IT WAS a bitterly cold Saturday afternoon, a typical January day at the football in Glasgow, when Tom Donaldson took up position at the foot of Stairway 13 inside Ibrox Stadium. The Old Firm game, a traditional New Year fixture, was about to start, and he remembers stamping his feet and blowing on his hands to warm up. “It was an ordinary day,” explains Tom, an experienced first-aider with St Andrew’s First Aid, formerly St Andrew’s Ambulance Association. “I was at the foot of the stairway with three of my colleagues.