Medics in the city of Christchurch are trying to “comprehend the incomprehensible” as they continue to treat the dozens of people wounded during the New Zealand mosque attacks.
A total of 50 people were killed in the shootings at two mosques during Friday prayers, while another 50 were injured.
Thirty-six people remain in Christchurch Hospital, 12 of them in intensive care, while a four-year-old girl is fighting for her life at a hospital in Auckland.
Greg Robertson, chief of surgery at Christchurch Hospital, described how victims were brought to the hospital in cars as well as ambulances as the horror unfolded on the streets of an otherwise peaceful city.
Asked how staff felt as the scale of the attacks became apparent, Mr Robertson added: “Horror. Stunned. Anger.”
Doctors battled with complex gun shot injuries and surgeons worked through the night to save the lives of victims who ranged in age from children to the elderly.
“Those who got here (to hospital) had a chance,” said Mr Robertson.
But as the atrocity sent shockwaves across the world, those on the front line were left to come to terms with the reality of what they had encountered.
“It’s a bit challenging for people – we are all part of the community and we’re struggling with it as much as anyone else,” said Mr Robertson.
“This is not something that we expected to see in our environment.
“We do see gunshot wounds, but 40, 50 people in a day is more than we should see.”
“Most people cope with things pretty well when you’re doing things,” he added.
“It’s when you go home and you think about it that that’s when the issues start to declare themselves.”
The magnitude of the attacks will have an impact on hospital staff for a long time to come, said Mr Robertson.
“It’s just comprehending what is incomprehensible”, he said.
“People will wonder if they could have done better, if there are things they could have done differently.”
While a terror attack of this scale is unprecedented in New Zealand, medics in Christchurch have experience of dealing with mass casualties following an earthquake in 2011 which killed 185 people.
But this was a different kind of tragedy.
“People had got their heads around the earthquake, it was something we couldn’t control,” he said.
“This… it’s that fact that someone has done this to our people, our friends, our colleagues, that is just unbelievable.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here