2015 in review: Year of terror and tragedies

It was the year the global fight against terrorism entered a new era – and sent shockwaves through the West Midlands.

So-called Islamic State, or ISIS, is the new face of evil that the world's powers have vowed to defeat. But the scenes of chaos and carnage in Paris last month showed the threat to innocent members of the public is greater than ever.

The Paris atrocities came 10 months after 11 people were killed at satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

But it was two attacks in Tunisia that tore apart communities in the Black Country and Staffordshire – leaving three members of the same family dead.

The Express & Star returned to Tunisia in October and saw a previously bustling tourist resort resembling a ghost town after holidays were cancelled and flights suspended.

In June, ISIS terrorist Seifeddine Rezgui opened fire on Western guests, killing 38 in total, including 30 Brits.

It was the bloodiest attack on British nationals in years. Victims included three Walsall FC fans from the same family: Joel Richards, aged 19, from Wednesbury, who was the youngest to be killed. He died alongside his uncle Adrian Evans, 49, who worked at Sandwell Council, from Bilston, and his 78-year-old father Pat Evans. Joel's younger brother Owen, 16, was the only survivor from the family trip. Also among the dead was Sue Davey, 44, who was originally from West Bromwich.

And three months earlier, mother-of-two Sally Adey, of Clayton near Shifnal, died in an attack at the Bardo Museum in the centre of capital Tunis.

Four months on, E&S reporter Rob Golledge found all but four of the 120 hotels in the resorts of Sousse and Port El Kantaoui were closed, with an estimated 40,000 workers having lost their jobs.

And the Imperial Marhaba Hotel, which was targeted in the attack, was deserted, with its manager saying it was 'heartbreaking'.

Meanwhile, in the Black Country friends and family of the victims are ensuring their memory will live on.

The new £8 million Wednesbury Leisure Centre has been named after Joel Richards, a University of Worcester student who had a huge interest in sport.

He was a football referee and had officiated in games involving Wolves' women's side. The Wolves Community Trust described Joel as a 'friend to everyone' at Wolves Women.

And the March attack left Mrs Adey's husband Robert returning home alone from what was meant to be a dream last-minute holiday. Mrs Adey, a 57-year-old solicitor, was one of 23 sightseers – including 18 foreign tourists – to be killed in the attack, and the only Briton.

The couple were on a cruise aboard the MSC Splendida.

Their story is tragically typical, of innocent people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Fast forward nine months, and music fans in Paris were among the latest victims of the wave of terror, mown down in a hail of gunfire as they watched the band Eagles of Death Metal at The Bataclan theatre.

Four AK47-armed Jihadists shouting 'Allahu Akbar' – God is great – started indiscriminately killing those who had crammed into the iconic concert hall, and within minutes 89 were dead.

Some climbed out of windows and hung from ledges 30ft from the ground to escape.

Witnesses described how the four jihadis shot those in wheelchairs first before picking off music fans one by one.

The assault was apparently well-organised with at least one attacker deployed to act as crowd control while the others shot innocent bystanders at will.

The Bataclan was the focal point of the attacks, but the Boulevard Voltaire, Belle Equipe bar, rue Fontaine au Roi, Petit Cambodge restaurant, and Le Carillon bar were also targeted.

Explosions could even be heard during a televised football match between France and Germany at the Stade de France as a suicide bomber detonated his explosives.

The world was still reeling from the revelation that the Metrojet airliner that crashed over Egypt's Sinai desert in October was destroyed by terrorists using a homemade bomb.

The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, vowed to find and punish those responsible and ordered an increase in airstrikes on Syria as 'inevitable retribution' for the attack that killed all 224 people on board, mainly returning Russian holidaymakers.

And it was in this climate of fear that the sheer scale of the threat to Britain became shockingly clear.

David Cameron has won support in the Commons for air strikes in Syria, and Britain is now fully embroiled in a fresh war on terror.

Not since 9/11, the subsequent invasion of Iraq and the London bombings in 2005, has this country faced such an imminent threat of a terrorist attack.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon even warned that, while the security forces were working hard to tackle the terror risk, an attack like that in Paris could not be ruled out in major cities.

But the public response to such a threat has been one of solidarity. Just as the words 'Je suis Charlie' spread across social media in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo killings in January, this time Facebook users imposed a French flag on their profile pictures.

Thousands turned out in vigils across Europe in January to prove the terrorists could not win, and this time crowds gathered in Trafalgar Square while monuments were lit up in the colours of the Tricolore to honour the victims.

Tragedy of a different kind struck at Alton Towers on June 2 when five people suffered horrendous injuries on The Smiler ride as two carriages collided. They were trapped 25ft above the ground, screaming in agony while fire crews struggled to reach them.

Seventeen-year-old Leah Washington's leg was amputated above the left knee and she also suffered a fractured left hand.

Her boyfriend Joe Pugh, 18, was left with two broken knees and a partially severed finger, while Victoria Balch, 20, had six rounds of surgery in a bid to save her leg, but ended up having it amputated. Her partner Daniel Thorpe, 28, also suffered serious leg injuries.

Chanda Chauhan, 49, from Wednesbury, who was sitting in the second row of the Smiler, suffered internal injuries.

An internal investigation by theme park operator Merlin Entertainments concluded the accident was caused by 'human error' – but the company announced the Smiler would reopen next year after putting in place a series of safety changes 'to ensure that an incident of this nature can never happen again'.

Staff misunderstood a shutdown message and wrongly restarted the ride, an investigation by the park confirmed.

No technical or mechanical issues were found with the ride itself. And though bosses hope to remain one of the top tourist attractions in the country, they face a fight to win back the trust of some sections of the public after attendances plummeted, leaving them having to make up to 190 staff redundant.

The Russian plane crash was the second high profile air disaster of the year, after co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, 27, deliberately flew a Germanwings jet into a mountain in the French Alps in March.

Initially speculation was rife that this was another terrorist attack, but investigators were mystified by the lack of any warning signal before the plane descended.

Martyn Matthews, from Wolverhampton, was among 150 killed by a pilot who had previously had to stop training due to 'burnout'.

Father-of-two Mr Matthews was only on the plane because he couldn't get a direct flight back to the West Midlands.

He was on the Airbus 320 after failing to find a direct route back to the region, after attending a business meeting in Barcelona. The former Scout leader who lived in Bushbury, was a season ticket holder at Molineux and worked at car components manufacturer Huf in Tipton.

The exact reasons for Lubitz to kill so many innocent passengers will probably never be known, though he appeared to have researched suicide methods and cockpit-door security days before.

Evidence from the recovered black box cockpit voice recorder indicated that Lubitz locked his captain out of the cockpit before putting the Airbus into a descent.

Months later, Mr Martyn's family and hundreds of others across the globe are trying to piece their lives back together and somehow look ahead to a new year. And as attention turns to Syria, fears of more terror and tragedy in 2016 seem only too real.