Polair footage shows intense shootout at Wieambilla

Police footage has captured the tense moments three family members were intent on a deadly shootout at rural property where two cops and a neighbour were murdered.

The tense moment special police operatives engaged in a terrifying shootout with three family members hellbent on murdering them has been revealed in chilling footage.

The footage, taken from a police aircraft, has detailed how dangerous the epicentre of the Wieambilla massacre was for all involved.

Constables Rachel McCrow and Matthew Arnold were gunned down at the property in the western Darling Downs.

Queensland Police constables Matthew Arnold, 26, and Rachel McCrow, 29, along with Mr Dare, 58, were killed in an ambush on December 12 last year.

The three shooters – Nathaniel, Gareth and Stacey Train – were later killed in a lengthy shootout with police that night.

Police have said the trio followed the fundamentalist religion “premillennialism”, believing Jesus Christ would return to Earth after a period of extreme suffering.

Polair had arrived at the property following the deaths of two officers and Alan Dare. Picture: QPS

The Trains’ final moments

The QPS Special Response Team arrived at the property about 7.40pm which led to a protracted shootout with the Trains.

In footage released by the coroner on Wednesday, Polair captured on video the moment one of the Train brothers fires his rifle at the helicopter before retreating to the house.

Stacey can be seen at times coming in and out of the house while Nathaniel lay behind a log barricade armed with multiple weapons, including Constable Arnold’s pistol.

The Train brothers can be seen laying in position while they shot at police. Picture: QPS

At one point, Stacey emerges from the house carrying two cups to Gareth and the two sit at a table behind the house, with Nathaniel nearby.

It’s while they’re sitting at this table, the husband and wife record a video revealing they’d killed the officers.

In the video – which was later uploaded to a now deleted YouTube account – Stacey and Gareth refer to police as “devils and demons”.

Gareth Train and Stacey Train later posted a video after the shootings to a now deleted YouTube channel.

The footage then captures Gareth shining a hunting light from his HiLux at the SERT BearCat as it approaches the house at 9.13pm.

The group also fire their weapons at the BearCat.

Gareth had claimed his position by the water tank while his brother remained at his log barricade.

In the footage, Stacey can be seen at the steps of the house while dogs remain behind her.

The inquest was told Gareth died from a gunshot wound to the head at 10.32pm, Stacey died from a gunshot wound to the head at 10.36pm.

Nathaniel was the last one to be fatally shot in the torso and the head about 10.39pm.

Stacey Train seen with her rifle standing on the steps of her Wieambilla home moments before she's fatally shot by police. Picture: QPS

‘Something’s wrong’: Neighbour gunned down

After spotting the black smoke, Mr Dare and his neighbour, Victor Lewis, phoned each other and decided to investigate what they thought was a house fire.

Mr Lewis told the inquest on he’d also heard gunshots but that wasn’t out of the ordinary for that part of the world.

Mr Dare and his wife Kerry had spotted smoke billowing from the Train property and called triple-0 at 5.13pm.

When the two mates arrived at the fire, they quickly discovered it was a car alight.

“Initially, when we got there, my initial thought was someone stole a car and torched it,” he said.

Mr Lewis said the fire kept “blowing up” and “the bush was alight” all around it.

Alan Dare died in a shooting at Wieambilla along with two police officers. Picture: Supplied

Mr Dare's phone footage shows a fire at the Trains’ property.

The inquest was told Mr Lewis didn’t realise Mr Dare was filming the unfolding event on his phone but it wasn’t uncommon for him to record things.

In the video, Mr Dare tells Mr Lewis that he’s spotted a car nearby.

“I did not see anyone … my mind was on the fire burning down what is a nature strip, footpath, whatever you call it,” he said.

“He was most likely looking (another direction) and he said there was another fire about 150m, 200m … by the time I looked up, I didn’t physically see anybody.”

Mr Lewis said he then turned back to look the other way and was about to leave to get fire equipment from his property when he noticed Mr Dare had fallen to the ground.

“I knelt down beside him and he said ‘what happened’?” Mr Lewis recalled.

“I looked down and he didn’t look good.

“I didn’t know what was wrong with him.

“Anyway, I’m a good person so I rolled him into the recovery position … and I saw blood.

“I’ve been around firearms all my life … I realised he’d been shot.”

Mr Lewis said he knew it “was time to leave” as the two friends lay on the ground.

“I would never say to someone that (Mr Dare) was deceased because I did not know,” he said.

“Butthere was somethingwrong.”

The inquest was told Mr Lewis unknowingly picked up Mr Dare’s phone, “semi crawled” back to his quad bike and called his wife to ring for help.

Mr Lewis said as he was riding to safety, he came across police officers at the top of the road and told them “I think my mate’s been shot”.

He said they explained “there’s an active shooter, you’ve got to get out of here” before they got back in their car and drove away.

Mr Lewis said he drove back to the Dare property to tell Mrs Dare what happened.

Victor Lewis recalls the moment his mate Alan Dare was murdered in front of him. Picture: Dan Peled / NewsWire

“First thing she saw was Al’s phone in my hand and asked me where Al was,” he said.

“I said ‘we’ve got to go’.

“I just said he’s been hurt, I couldn’t say anymore but Kerry said she wanted to go down where he was.

“I would do the same thing but I knew something wasn’t right.

“I had to convince her to come with me.

“It was hard on me and hard on her because she wanted to be down there to see what happened.”

The pair then went back to the Lewis property where Mrs Lewis joined them as they went to seek a safe place to wait out the horrifying event.

But Mr Lewis said despite asking for answers, police refused to provide any information about what was unfolding.

He told the inquest the residents in the area should have been given warnings about the gunfire.

“Myself and Alan knew nothing of this,” he said.

“Why were we not advised in some way to stay in our homes?

“They do (warning systems) anywhere else.

“They should have told us to stay in our home, if nothing else.

“This is not a derogatory statement against police. Their job is hard enough.

“This is to make things better in the future so something like this doesn’t happen again.

“That’s all I want.”

Investigators were unable to determine who fired the fatal shot that killed Mr Dare.

Nathaniel Train had been a principal at several schools around Queensland and NSW before joining his brother at the Wieambilla property.

Stacey and Gareth Train had been living in Wieambilla for about 12 months.

The triple-0 calls

The two triple-0 calls Mrs Dare made were played before the court on Wednesday.

In the first call at 5.13pm, she tells the dispatcher about the “big bang” they’d heard and how they could smell “electrical burning”.

“We’re hearing what we think is gunshots, but now we’re smelling electrical burning,” Mrs Dare says on the audio.

“There’s been people with gunshots across the road for the last hour or so but there’s been two big bangs for the last 10 mins, not gunshots, and now there’s all this smoke in the air.

“We’re in the bush, it doesn’t smell like grass fire.”

The inquest was told Mr Dare had gone to his front gate to see if he could get a clearer view of where the smoke was coming from before returning back to his wife.

Four minutes later, Mrs Dare called triple-0 again at 5.17pm with an update about what her husband had seen at the front of his property.

While she was on the phone with the dispatcher, Mr Dare told her he’d phoned their neighbour Victor Lewis and they’d agreed to go see if they could find the fire in an effort to help.

Kerry and Alan Dare saw black smoke near their property. Picture: Facebook

Mrs Dare told the dispatcher her husband was heading out in his car, but she was advised he shouldn’t do that.

“I probably wouldn’t, I would just stay at home,” the dispatcher tells Mrs Dare.

She replied: “(The Lewis family have) already lost a house in the fire, I don’t think they’re going to stay.”

The dispatcher again tells her: “I’m going to strongly advise against that.”

But Mr Dare had driven off and was killed minutes later.

Mrs Dare didn’t know her husband was driving off to his death.

“They were gone by the time she’d finished,” Mrs Dare said on Wednesday.

“She should of done (said) it quicker.”

Kerry Dare, the widow of Alan Dare, leaves the Brisbane Coroners Court after giving evidence. Picture: Dan Peled / NewsWire

The inquest was told Mr Lewis arrived back at the Dare property minutes later to tell Mrs Dare what had happened.

“He came back on the quad … and said ‘Al’s in a bad way’. He threw me the phone and he left again,” Mrs Dare said.

The two neighbours then made their way down the road to where police had set up a command centre.

“We were never allowed at the command, we were on the other side of the road cordoned off and we stayed there till 6pm,” Mrs Dare said.

Aerial vision of the Train property, which neighbours say they didn’t realise was occupied. Pictures: 9 News.

The inquest was told a police officer later informed Mrs Dare her husband was dead.

She said the way he told her the horrifying information was “disgusting and immoral” and she was given no further information.

The inquest was told the police officer had said police couldn’t go onto the Train property because they “can’t risk officers” because of active shooters.

When QPS Commissioner Steve Gollschewski’s legal representative Ian Freckelton asked whether she’d phoned her husband after he left the property, Mrs Dare replied: “No, I didn’t know what the danger was.”

Mrs Dare told the inquest she believed there were more conversations on the triple-0 calls that weren’t played before the court.

“I think some of it missing,” she said.

“ There was something said during the phone call that sticks adamantly – the caller saying, ‘I heard that’.

“It was a gunshot, and I said, ‘I heard it too’.

“Since then I learnt it was Al being shot, but when I listen to those calls, none of that is there.”

Mrs Dare said had she’d been told there was an active shooter, she would have called her husband immediately.

“I would have called my husband to come back or someone should have,” she said.

“I would have hung up on her and called him, she’s not in danger.”

Outside court, Mrs Dare said she was “happy with the way things went”.

The ambush occurred at the Wains Rd property is in Wieambilla, north west of Brisbane

Mr Dare’s final moments captured on film

Frantic footage filmed on his phone shows Mr Dare arriving at the spot where – unbeknown to him – a police car had been set on fire.

He tells Mr Lewis, who also arrived at the scene, to not “get too close” as the fire is “still going off”.

“What the hell is in that?” Mr Dare says.

“I’m going to stay away Vic.”

Moments later, he spots a car “driving off”.

Smoke billowed from the Trains’ property.

“There’s a car coming,” Mr Dare tells Mr Lewis.

“There’s a car over there, and there’s someone at the door.

“Woah, someone just got out that car, Vic.

“Someone just got out of that other car, they walked off.”

The video played before the court is paused seconds before Mr Dare was fatally shot.

The inquest continues on Thursday.

Originally published as Polair footage shows intense shootout at Wieambilla