A 'shambolic' breakdown in communications led to firefighters not being deployed to the scene of the Manchester Arena bomb, an internal investigation has revealed.

A joint internal inquiry by the Fire Brigades Union and Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has also revealed:

*County Fire Officer, Pete O’Reilly, was not informed the bomb had gone off for 35 minutes

*Fire brigade bosses followed protocol by not deploying crews due to the potential risk of a second terrorist incident

*However, the brigade claims it did not know until nearly two hours after the attack that the threat had been lifted

Dozens of firefighters complained that they were not deployed to help people injured in the May 22 attack.

This included specialist anti-terror crews - created in the wake of the Mumbai attacks in 2008 - who were kept back despite being dispatched to within half a mile of the Manchester Arena.

Senior fire managers have spent weeks debriefing staff and analysing what happened on the night of the attack.

Their findings have now been delivered to a top peer Lord Bob Kerslake who has been tasked with reviewing how all emergency services responded to the May 22 attack.

His interim report will be published in January, with a full report in March.

However, the internal review carried out by the fire service has already identified a number of failures relating to communication on the night.

(Image: Joel Goodman)

A senior fire source said: “There was a total break down of communication which was shambolic. No one told the County Fire Officer the bomb had gone off for 35 minutes - that has been questioned and a new process put in place.

“The police and ambulance services have self-deployed after the bomb has gone off - by playing by the rules, we have been left behind.

“At 10.47 GMP declared it was a Plato incident - the code-word for an ongoing terrorist threat - it was only after the County Fire Officer sent an officer to GMP headquarters that they found out - after midnight - that the threat was lifted.”

Plato is Home Office guidance and GMP and North West Ambulance chose to deploy officers to the scene - including GMP Armed Response Teams. They will supply their own reports to Lord Kerslake.

The source said: “The brigade’s managers were not going to deploy firefighters if it was believed active shooters were still on the loose.”

They added: “The police were not speaking to us. There was a void. The fire service were left in a black hole with no information.”

Firefighters have claimed that all crews, even terrorist response teams were stopped from entering the Arena for just short of two hours.

Some crew members have spoken of their 'shame' at not being sent in when other 999 services were in the Arena helping casualties.

The internal FBU and brigade report has now been fed into evidence into Lord Kerslake’s review.

GM Fire and Rescue service said it would not comment on the findings until Lord Kerslake had delivered his official inquiry.

(Image: Manchester Evening News)

The office of Greater Manchester Mayor, Andy Burnham, declined to comment, saying it was not appropriate to discuss issues that will form part of Lord Kerslake’s review.

But commenting last month on the Lord Kerslake report, which he commissioned, Mr Burnham said: “As with any major incident, it is right to take an honest look at what happened so that the right lessons can be learned for the future and this review will help us be even better prepared in the future and allow us to share our learning with other parts of the country.

“It’s great to have someone of Lord Kerslake’s stature and considerable experience to carry out this important review.”

Beverley Hughes, Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, said: “Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has conducted its own debrief of the organisation’s response to the Manchester Arena Attack and is cooperating fully with the Kerslake Arena Review which is looking at what happened that night and in the days afterwards.

"We have encouraged all staff including, in particular, operational crew across the organisation to contribute information openly through the independent channels provided by the review. The review panel will meet with crew to hear their views around the response and this will be organised independently of GMFRS. It would be inappropriate for us to comment further whilst the review is ongoing.”

GMP did not respond to the fire service claims that they were kept in the dark about the risk of a second attack being lifted.

However, the force’s top officer said he was waiting for the full findings of Lord Kerslake to be published.

(Image: Manchester Evening News)

Chief Constable Ian Hopkins said: “It is hugely disappointing to see yet again information being leaked in relation to the attack at Manchester Arena. This will be causing the families of the victims further pain and anguish as they continue to grieve for their loved ones. It is made worse that a member of the emergency services has chosen to do this without the full review process being completed, which would give the entire picture to families.

"Greater Manchester Police duty on the night of the attack was to preserve life and protect life. We deployed immediately to the scene of the attack in order to do this.

"We recognise it is our role in these situations to put ourselves in as much danger as the public and that’s what officers and staff did. This was done in a controlled and planned way along with North West Ambulance Service.

“We will await the outcome of our debriefs and the independent review before commenting further.”

The North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) said they were confident that their own response would be recognised as effective by Lord Kerlake, a former civil service chief.

A spokeswoman said: “Despite the clear risk we were faced with, the decision was made to allow three members of staff into the foyer where the blast had taken place. The first clinician was on scene within four minutes of the 999 emergency call being allocated and the other two clinicians followed.

“Their job was to triage the injured and work with police to move people to a place close by where they could be treated safely - and where 25 paramedics were waiting, in accordance with our major incident plan.

“Within an hour all critical patients had been moved and were being treated by 50 paramedics. Some people had already been taken to hospital. Within four hours, all the injured that required hospital care had been transferred.”

The M.E.N. has been leaked details of the brigade’s response on the night of the attack:

10.31pm - bomb goes off at Manchester Arena.

10.48pm - Fire engines from Manchester Central and Gorton stations are mobilised to meet at Philips Park Station

11.15pm - Two brigade group managers are mobilised to Philips Park and arrive at 11.25pm and 11.30pm.

11.45pm - The brigade’s inter-agency liaison officer - responsible for engaging with other emergency services - arrives at Philips Park.

11.58pm Crews return to Manchester Central.

12.18pm Two appliances from Manchester Central and one from Philips Park are finally sent to Arena, arriving about two minutes later.

Short time later two further crews sent from Salford station