Manchester Arena attack witness aims to help NHS disaster training

Yasmin Reevell suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder following the attack

A woman who was caught up in the Manchester Arena bombing is using her experiences to try to help others responding to future disasters.

Yasmin Reevell suffered post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after witnessing the attack on 22 May 2017.

After graduating from York College, she now helps train NHS staff by using her make-up and special effects skills to create realistic-looking injuries.

Ms Reevell said she knew her work would be "helping me and other people".

She had just turned 18 when she attended the Ariana Grande concert at which 22 people were murdered.

Ms Reevell, from Sutton upon Derwent, near York, was not injured in the attack, but saw the aftermath of the blast.

The 24-year-old said she later struggled with worsening PTSD, which led her to drop out from studying a music degree.

The 24-year-old graduated from York College with a degree in make-up and special effects

She instead decided to enrol at York College to study for a degree in make-up and special effects.

It has led to her landing a job with medical prosthetics firm Simbodies, which creates immersive training environments, including mannequins with injuries, to help train army and medical staff.

"Without the prosthetics and silicone dummies we give the military and NHS, they wouldn't know what to do when things like the Manchester attack happen," Ms Reevell said.

She said she hoped the job would enable her to help others and had led her to believe that "everything happens for a reason".

Ms Reevell completed the final project of her degree on the topic of PTSD, a choice her tutors feared would be difficult for her.

"I did wonder if it was the right thing to be doing but, in the grand scheme of things, I knew I'd been through enough to know how to deal with it," she said.

"It was helping me and other people by shining a light on it."