Before the outbreak of the Troubles, a typical firefighter's year might have included call-outs to chimney fires, the occasional house fire or road accident, then everything changed, and Northern Ireland's firefighters spent almost every day of the next thirty years racing to the scenes of atrocitie...

Before the outbreak of the Troubles, a typical firefighter's year might have included call-outs to chimney fires, the occasional house fire or road accident, then everything changed, and Northern Ireland's firefighters spent almost every day of the next thirty years racing to the scenes of atrocities, running towards the gravest danger.