An infamous school shooting in Dunblane has become a media focus again this week after a brand-new Channel 4 documentary looking into how it led to the UK outright banning handguns.
The Dunblane massacre took place in 1996 in the small Scottish town, and saw the perpetrator shoot 17 people at a school and then himself.
One bizarre detail about the shooting however is that Andy Murray and his brother Jamie ‘narrowly escaped’ the now infamous incident.
Thomas Hamilton, 43, carried out the shooting, entering Dunblane primary school with four handguns and 743 rounds of ammunition.
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He proceeded to use these to open fire on children skipping in the gym hall.
He killed 16 children, as well as Gwen Mayor, a teacher who was killed trying to protect her students.
Lasting just under four minutes the attack is the still the deadliest atrocity using firearms ever carried out in the UK, and led to the government completely banning handguns and placing greater restrictions on all guns.
The Murray family lived in Dunblane at the time, with both Jamie and Andy being in primary school.
Speaking about the incident to The Guardian, their Mum Judy Murray explained how close Andy had been to tragedy.
She said: “Andy's class had been on their way to the gym.
“That's how close he was to what happened. They heard the noise and someone went ahead to investigate. They came back and told all the kids to go to the headmaster's study and the deputy head's study.
“They were told to sit down below the windows, and they were singing songs. The teachers and dinner ladies did an amazing job, containing all these children, feeding them, and getting them out without them being aware of what had happened.
“I don't know how they managed it."
She explained that she drove to the school ‘thinking I might not see my children again’, adding: "People weren't frantic. They were shocked, quiet. It was before mobile phones. Nobody knew anything."
A new Channel 4 documentary will now examine some of the brave parents who took this unspeakable tragedy and turned it into lasting change.
Called The Dunblane Tapes the doc's synopsis reads: “After the 1996 mass shooting at Dunblane, a campaign was launched to ban private handguns in the UK. This remarkable story can now be told with unseen video filmed by a bereaved parent.”
The documentary is timed to mark the 30th anniversary of the massacre in March.
In the doc deputy headteacher Fiona Eadington heartbreakingly said: “Those children were given to my care and I didn’t protect them.”
The Dunblane Tapes airs on Channel 4 tonight, 9pm.
Topics: Channel 4, Andy Murray, UK News, TV and Film, TV, Documentaries
Michael Slavin