I am trying to claim for treatment for a family member who is ex forces and suffers form acute depression.
All the other agency's hare holding off making a decision until the veterans agency make a ruling.
They have asked for a single incident that may of cause of made worse the condition.
After several weeks of torture for him , I have the following statement to send to the trying to answer the following questions
.the date time and place
.your involvement and where you were at the time
. the service duties you were carrying out at the time
.the names and ranks of any witnesses or colleagues
the immediate and long-term effects on yourself
.Whether you reported the effects the incident had on you and if so the date you reported them and to whom
. whether you sought medical treatment or advice at the time of the incidents and if so the dates of treatment and the place where treatment took place

On the 6th July 1998 I was drafted from HMS Drake in Plymouth were I had been under treatment for a knee injury and depression, to HMS Raleigh in Torpoint, fire fighting school.
My medical category at the time was P7 RA and I was still tacking anti deposing medication.
This was a so called “crash draft” were I was informed late in the afternoon on Friday 2nd July by the duty writer in the base office after she had found me in my bunk space by luck.
I had not gone home for the weekend although I was entitled to do so at 12 pm , as I did not feel up to travelling home to Seaham via a nine hour train journey and was planning to spend the weekend in my bunk area.
As I was due to report to the fire fighting school for 7.30 am on the Monday, I had no option but to report to my new duties, as all the relevant officers and senior ratings that could have helped me were no longer available, as they had gone home for the weekend at 12 pm and only the duty staff were in any office on the base mostly ratings answering telephones and tacking messages to be passed onto the relevant people on Monday morning.

I reported for duties as told at the fire fighting school, but when the warrant officer in charge that I was medically downgraded, he tried to contact the manpower section to have me moved away, but he was told my records where not available so he was stuck with me. At the time he was 4 safety ratings short according to the stated manpower and had already closed down one fire training unit to spread the manpower around.

I was given the training as a safety number for the fire fighting units over the next two weeks, although I kept on stating to anybody who would listen I did not like this work as it’s too much for me to handle.

The main duties of a safety rating were as follows.

Maintain the safety and wellbeing of all personal in the fire fighting training area
Responsible for the equipment in the training area
Responsible for lighting training fires in the training area

Their were also several other duties including supervising classroom work and area cleanliness also to these main duties.

The incident that I believe made my condition worse took place two weeks after I completed the training.
The class I was supervising were still in basic training but were in the final stages of their training week. The scenario was a major ship fire in several rooms. I was in charge of the final room were we simulated a high temperature fire by setting light to three large burners (Large trays fill with old railways sleepers and coated in a mixture of petrol and kerosene know as flash. To raze the temperature further we liberally through in large cup full of this mixture every few minutes. It was not unusual to use three or four buckets full of this mix to raze the temperature over 500 degrees. I noticed on this run that the steel floor of the unit had split and was rising up due to the heat, and was dangerous, so I called a safeguard and went to put out the fire with a fire fighting hose. As I did this another fire fighting hose in used by a trainee team was also put onto the fire as they had not heard the safety call. Because the were using a more powerful fire fighting hose when the stream of water hit the fire, it caused a large fireball, which did not hit then but enveloped me. Because I was wearing full fire fighting safety gear I was not physically hurt. I immediately reported to the warrant officer in charge and told him what had happen and that I could not handle this job any more. I also went to the sickbay went to see the duty doctor who put me on light duties for two weeks and increased the dosage of Prozac. I was then internally inside HMS Raleigh transferred to the gym were I was given the duties as a store man. I was in this role until 29 November when I was upgraded to P2 category after the doctor took me off the Prozac and was drafted onboard HMS Iron Duke. I was only on this ship until 14 January 1999 were I had the first of my panic attacks and was hospitalised for a day.
I still have flash backs of the fireball especially when I smell petrol. The small also starts me coiffing uncontrollably; my wife states it sounds as though I smoke 60 a day.


I am unable to remember any names of people due to the passage of time



I would like somebody to look this over and let me know if you think there is a case

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