‘Miraculous no one got hit’: Hero bystander recounts moment gun was fired inside Sydney Airport

A hero bystander has recounted how disaster was narrowly avoided at Sydney Airport on Wednesday morning, when a police gun was fired inside the busy terminal after he ran in to help officers restrain a man.

Bystander William John Wilcher, a Sydney barrister and an ex-NSW Police dog handler, said it was “miraculous that no one got hit” during the early morning rush inside Terminal 2, which services domestic Jetstar and Virgin flights.

The firearm was unintentionally discharged just after 6am during the arrest of a 41-year-old Victorian man next to gate 49, just metres away from Veloce cafe, and near Wine Selectors and Fat Yak Bar.

AFP officers were called to investigate when airline staff observed a man acting suspiciously. When they approached him the man allegedly became “verbally and physically aggressive”, prompting the officers to initiate an arrest, the AFP said in a statement.

Wilcher told the Herald he was at the airport to board a flight to Townsville with his mate, an off-duty police officer, when they noticed an altercation was unfolding.

“I saw two AFP officers … wrestling with a person. They were having difficulty with him, he was a very tall person,” he said.

“The struggle went to the ground. Somehow, the firearms officer’s firearm got underneath the person.”

He said the instincts of his former occupation kicked in as the pair ran in to help, each grabbing one of the man’s hands. Wilcher said the short-barrelled rifle was wedged underneath the man, with the butt visible on one side, and the barrel pointing out the other way.

“Luckily, the barrel of the firearm was not pointed towards any of us when the shot was discharged. It was miraculous that no one got hit,” Wilcher said, noting he was within 20 centimetres of the bullet.

“The airport is very, very busy at that time in the morning.”

Nine’s Today reported that travellers in the terminal dropped to the ground when the shot rang out.

Wilcher and his friend held their positions, even as the gun was fired, applying a wrist lock that allowed the man to be handcuffed.

Once the man was restrained, he began to yell, “Someone record this because this isn’t the real AFP”.

The man was taken to Mascot Police Station where he was charged with obstructing and hindering a Commonwealth official and creating a disturbance at an airport. He was granted conditional bail.

AFP Acting Commander Scott Raven said the bullet was fired “very low to the ground”, hitting a wall about a metre away and then lodging inside the oven of the Veloce Cafe.

The specifics of the gun’s discharge remain under investigation, including whether its safety mechanism was correctly engaged.

“All our AFP officers are professional, highly trained and skilled officers. As part of their duties here, and at all our airports, we have a counterterrorism first response, and that includes carrying short-barrel rifles,” he told reporters on Wednesday afternoon.

The man was known to police and had interacted with them at the airport on Tuesday afternoon.

“We had dealt with him yesterday in relation to a number of incidents of behaviour, and he left the airport,” Raven said.

While the airport itself was not locked down, Jetstar personnel were secured in a locked room for a short period after the incident.

After his heroics, Wilcher carried on with his day as if nothing had happened, boarding his flight to Townsville, where, in an ironic twist, he is attending a sports shooting competition.

Wilcher practices out of the Sir Owen Dixon Chambers in Sydney and Newcastle, and carried on with some work on the three-hour-long flight, which departed without delay.

While Raven thanked Wilcher and his companion for their assistance, he added that the AFP “would not encourage members of the public attempting to assist law enforcement in any situation, unless asked to do so”.

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