Grim anniversary: Bodies, blood and an empty pram Andy Reid can’t forget

Andy Reid rushed around Bondi Junction shopping centre trying to save stabbing victims, with no clue his running buddy Ash Good was inside. On a grim anniversary, the memories still haunt him.

As Andy Reid rushed between two critically ill women lying on the shopping centre floor, desperate to stem the blood pooling around them from their knife wounds, he couldn’t help but notice an abandoned pram.

“It really stuck out to me, that pram just sitting there,” Reid recalled, his ordinary shopping trip for bunk beds for his children suddenly a frantic quest to help as many severely wounded shoppers as he could.

“It was like a scene from a movie, bodies and blood everywhere and this empty pram. I remember wondering ‘did it belong to the woman that I had just been working on, the one that I knew wasn’t going to make it because she’d lost so much blood’?”

HEROES AND SURVIVORS: ONE MONTH AFTER THE ATTACK

It didn’t. Reid would later find out the pram belonged to his running buddy Ash Good.

It had been carrying her baby Harriett before the terrified mum plunged her child into the arms of strangers, desperate to shield her from the knife-wielding killer.

Thankfully Harriett was rushed to safety. Her mum died at the hands of Joel Cauchi who in just a few minutes had ended the lives of six innocent people. The others were Yixuan Cheng 27, Dawn Singleton, 25, Faraz Ahmed Tahir, 30, Jade Young, 47, and Pikria Darchia, 55.

Bondi surf lifesaver Andy Reid, right, says he feels numb 12 months on from the Bondi Junction shopping centre massacre that claimed the life of his running buddy, Ashlee Good, left. Pictures: Jonathan Ng/Supplied

It wasn’t until Reid got outside that the pram’s significance hit him like a bullet to the stomach.

He hadn’t known his friend was caught up in the horror of April 13, 2024, until then.

‘I KEEP SEEING THE PRAM’

“Literally 20 minutes after I walked out of there, I found out Ash was inside,” Reid recalled.

“And then I said, ‘did she have Harriett with her?’ and they said ‘yeah’ and I was like ‘Oh my god, that was her pram’.

“That pram is something I just keep on seeing. It’s my reminder of the senselessness of what happened that day.

“That man robbed this beautiful baby of her mother and this beautiful mother of experiencing this miracle of raising her baby.

Dawn Singleton was among those slain in the attack. Picture: Supplied

Chinese national Yixuan Cheng was also killed. Picture: Supplied

“The connection I had with Ash is we would talk about parenting, and how excited she was when she told me she was pregnant … she’s been robbed of that, her daughter’s been robbed.”

The seasoned Bondi lifeguard is no stranger to casualties, functioning while in extreme danger under extreme stress and relying on his instincts and training.

But this was different.

“It was almost like an out-of-body experience,” he said.

“I often wonder if I was to see the CCTV from that day what it would look like, because to me, I knew I was rushing between bodies but it also felt like I was standing there for 10 minutes looking at the pram, wondering where it had come from.”

Reid – better known as Reidy on the hit reality TV series Bondi Rescue – helped treat as many people as he could, clogging knife wounds with pieces of clothing from nearby stores.

At that stage he didn’t know the gunshots he heard earlier was not a crazed gunman as he’d thought, but NSW police officer Amy Scott shooting dead Joel Cauchi, stopping his reign of terror.

Bondi stabbing victim Ash Good, who was a running buddy of Andy Reid’s. Picture: Supplied.

“There were so many heroes that day. That cop is a hero and while no one ever wants to take someone else’s life I hope she knows what a hero she was and that she did the right thing.

“Then there were the two fellas that helped stall the attacker with the bollard.”

Reid has regular contact with other people who helped that day with whom he formed a lifelong bond that day.

“I think this situation is just so different to anything else, it was obviously on another level,” he said.

Bondi massacre victim Faraz Tahir

Pikria Darchia was also killed.

“I’ve seen some pretty gnarly stuff on the beach. I’ve had someone drown in front of me, a really bad suicide, but Westfield was worse than any of that. And the fact that it’s at the hands of someone trying to do harm, that’s something else.”

Reid says the support around him has got him through.

“I’m lucky to have some of the most incredible friends a person could ask for. Always there to listen when I need to talk,” he said.

Jade Young also lost her life at the hands of the killer.

“There’s a few of us who are in contact on a group chat. I guess that’s how communities are built, through common experiences and in this case, we got brought together on another level. So much emotion.

“For me personally, I think about what happened 12 months ago from so many different angles,” he said.

“I’m a dad and I try to put myself in the shoes of people like John Singleton who lost his daughter. I just can’t even fathom it.”

Shopping in Bondi Junction changed forever on April 13, 2024, but the Scentre Group has worked hard to make people feel safe again.

After the Bondi attack, the company introduced additional personal protective equipment, including vests, for all security officers in every Westfield.

Andy Reid is devastated his friend Ash Good will never get to watch her daughter grow up. Picture: Jonathan Ng

Last month Team Safety Cameras were rolled out across 42 Westfield destinations across Australia and New Zealand.

“The introduction of the team safety cameras is to enhance the safety and security of our customers, business partners and team members,” a spokeswoman said.

“Our security officers may turn on the recording function on the team safety cameras to capture audio and video recordings of incidents when they have reasonable concern for their safety or welfare.”

The inquest into the tragedy, due to start later this month, will look at the response of Scentre Group and its security subcontractors.

It will also look at the status of CCTV security monitoring at Westfield Bondi Junction, the efficacy of the alarm and warning systems and the adequacy of the training of security guards.

As Reid, and no doubt other people caught up in the horror will attest, it’s the questions about the man who caused the chaos that will be the most confronting.

The world will have more of a picture of this man who moved from Queensland to NSW in December 2023, of his mental health conditions and the treatment he was or wasn’t receiving.

The inquest will look at this killer’s state of mind, and whether there are any “identifiable motives” for the day he changed Sydney forever.

For Reid, the answers won’t bring sense to something so senseless.

“I guess the only thing I feel is numb. I’m just numb, that really is the only word I have to describe it.”