A group of pals scaled the Forth Bridge and sparked a major emergency response.
Tomer Brown, Ryan McLoughlin, Peter Taylor and Ricky Yuen were seen waving their arms and flashing a light from the top of the iconic railway bridge one night last summer.
A police helicopter was scrambled to help them and passing trains had to be slowed.
The men, aged between 22 and 25, appeared at Dunfermline Sheriff Court this week to admit breaching the peace by conducting themselves in a disorderly manner.
They admitted climbing to the top of the Forth Bridge‘s south cantilever and descending to track level without permission or any safety equipment.
Defence lawyers said their clients all had climbing experience and had no intention to cause such a fuss.
The court heard none of the men have previous convictions and all have good career prospects, including one at a Michelin star restaurant and another working at an international space station.
Solicitors representing all four men called for an absolute discharge but Sheriff Francis Gill said this would not be “appropriate”
He described their behaviour as “very serious” and called for the prosecution to discover the cost of the emergency response in time for sentencing next month.
Helicopter scrambled
Procurator fiscal depute Azrah Yousaf told the court a couple in a South Queensferry car park spotted figures silhouetted at the top of the angled span of the railway bridge cantilever on the night of July 30 last year.
A short time earlier they had seen males wearing dark clothing further down the structure.
Ms Yousaf said the figures were seen at the top of the bridge appearing to “wave their arms in the air” and they “flashed a light”.
Police attended with railway bridge staff at around 10.30pm.
The fiscal said: “A helicopter had to be scrambled to see if any help was required.”
The men were advised not to come down for their own safety and trains were slowed to prevent any more disruption.
She said: “At one stage officers were telling the young men to stand back while a train passes and once it passed (they were) taken down from bridge and thereafter placed under arrest”.
‘Foolish and dangerous’
Taylor’s defence lawyer, Calum Harris, said the four friends had travelled to Scotland for his client’s birthday and the bridge climb was a “spur of the moment decision” before going to visit family in Edinburgh.
Mr Harris said: “He accepts in hindsight it was a foolish and dangerous decision and one that can cost him in future.”
The solicitor said the route taken by the men was largely platformed to the top of the bridge.
The court heard all the men are worried about the damage a conviction could do to their career prospects.
Mr Harris said his 23-year-old client, from Islington, works in a Michelin star restaurant in London and recently received an offer of promotion.
Brown’s lawyer said his client, also 23, wanted to apologise to members of the emergency services who had to attend.
He said Brown, of London, who has a university degree and is a carer for his father, has been climbing most of his life and considers himself “accomplished”.
The solicitor stressed the group had been “contained” within the structure for most of the climb.
Conviction could ‘hamper’ prospects
McLoughlin’s lawyer said her 22-year-old client is employed full-time as a software engineer and has a first-class degree in physics and nuclear astrophysics.
He hopes to gain employment in a space company outside the UK.
The lawyer said: “A conviction is of significant concern to him and the possibility it may hamper future prospects”.
She said McLoughlin, of Ruislip, described himself as an “experienced mountaineer” and this was a case of a young man who found himself capable of doing the climb without considering the wider implications.
She added: “He has learned his lesson”.
Yuen’s solicitor, David McLaughlin, said his 25-year-old client maintained they had not scaled the outside of the structure but walked up a walkway for the most part.
The lawyer said the men had not expected the kind of reaction they got and argued it was a different scale of breaching the peace compared to, for example, someone going into a crowd and shouting “I have a bomb”.
Mr McLaughlin said his client, a civil engineer from Dagenham, was always of the view their conduct was never going to endanger others.
Sheriff Gill deferred sentence until February 23 for the production of background reports.
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