From great escapes to volcanic eruptions, a new prime minister to a raw-meat dress, we review the most dramatic moments of the year through the eyes of those with first-hand experience?
12 January: Haiti's capital is devastated by an earthquake.
By Simon Cording, rescue worker
Day to day I'm a fireman, but I'm also part of the International Search and Rescue Team. We are deployed whenever disasters take place around the world. I was at work in Manchester when I got a text message telling me to get myself ready because we were going to Haiti later that day. We always have our bags ready, so it was just a matter of grabbing my passport. It was snowing in the UK and Heathrow was closed, but we got special dispensation to fly out around midnight and the airport was opened just for us.
We were met by scenes of mass devastation at Port au Prince airport. As we walked out, there were bodies strewn all over the streets. Literally piles of bodies ? you couldn't look anywhere without seeing something you didn't want to see. People were sleeping on pavements, in the street and in parks ? anywhere where they weren't too close to a wall, for fear of aftershocks.
Imagine a scene from a Hollywood film that looks too dramatic to be believable. That's what Haiti looked like ? the end of the world. And the devastation was relentless: you'd drive for hours and hours, and it didn't end. There wasn't a neighbourhood or suburb that got away unscathed.
There were crowds of people who wanted to help us as translators, drivers, lifters and shifters ? anything. That was humbling, considering they had lost everything. We were tasked with searching a church that was mid-service when the earthquake happened. We had to remember that we were there looking for live casualties; if we got bogged down with body recovery we would never get anything else done.
We found Mia on the first day. A civilian approached someone in my team and said that her family was trapped and asked us to go and help. It was a snap judgment: we stopped what we were doing and headed over to the three-storey nursery about a mile away. The whole building had collapsed and two-year-old Mia had been in the basement. We spent four or five hours tunnelling; we couldn't quite get to her, but we could hear her and we were able to pass fluids to her to start the rehydration process. Eventually we crawled into the hole one after another and handed her down the line until eventually we were able to put her in her mother's arms.
It was an amazing feeling, but we couldn't be too elated at the time because there were the bodies of six children who'd died around her right there, and those kids' parents were watching us pull Mia out ? you have to be sensitive to everyone. We got to see her again at the Pride of Britain Awards last month, and she's doing great ? she's at another nursery and she's making new friends.
The loss of life doesn't shock me any more ? it's something that we're prepared for in this line of work. But I became aware of how cheap life seemed in Haiti. In Britain we have the luxury of grief ? of funerals and burials. The memory that will never leave me is the image of a JCB picking up bodies to be dumped in mass graves. Thousands and thousands of bodies, just like that. It's something you can't comprehend.
27 January: Apple launches the iPad.
By David Rowan, editor of Wired
There had been an awareness in the industry for some time that tablet computing devices would be a big deal in 2010, but the iPad was the first to capture the public imagination. It's lived up to the hype, and according to Apple is now the fastest-selling consumer electronic device ever. I now see people onstage at conferences reading from their iPads rather than notes, and over the next year it will become a much more persuasive consumer proposition: you're going to see them lying around people's kitchens as recipe books or on the sofa as a TV.
On 28 May, the day the iPads were put on sale in the UK, we headed down to the Regent Street flagship store, where 1,000 people were queueing round the block, and distributed copies of Wired to keep people occupied.
It's the first product launch I can recall that has so quickly been transformative to so many industries: this device is going to give new business models to media companies and publishers and make it much easier for people to make money out of their content. Watch this space.
7 March: Kathryn Bigelow wins the best director Oscar.
By Danny Leigh, film critic
The head-to-head between Kathryn Bigelow and James Cameron for the Best Director Oscar never turned into the controversy it promised, but it was an amazing story anyway. Not only had they divorced, but their films seemed to represent the two different sides of cinema, two differing opinions on what films are there for.
The Hurt Locker was incredibly stripped down and unsentimental, a plausible, naturalistic glimpse into the US military, while Avatar was an immersive journey into another world. We had to ask ourselves which reality we wanted to buy into. For me, Avatar was just a technological achievement, so I was delighted when Barbra Streisand called out Kathryn Bigelow's name. It felt, for once, like the right person had won.
It's too soon to say if Bigelow's win changed cinema ? if it means that more films by women will be green-lit ? but it's good to see that landmark, the first female director to win an Oscar, finally reached. It's an especially important achievement because it's a war movie ? a male genre ? and Hurt Locker is a gender-fluid film. Twenty-five years down the line, hopefully there'll be a new generation of female directors who will have seen the 2010 Oscars and realised they don't have to make "women's movies".
20 April: A BP rig explodes, causing a catastrophic oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.
By Sylvia Earle, oceanographer
When the explosion on BP's Deepwater Horizon rig occurred, I heard straightaway ? it was on the news, the web, all over the place. My first reaction was absolute dismay. The loss of lives was immediately apparent and as the tragedy unfolded ? the collapse of the rig and then the appearance of massive amounts of oil ? there was widespread concern, and fear, that the amount of oil that was actually coming out did not match with the official announcements that BP was releasing. The disparity was clear within the first few days.
As a child, I'd spent many hours on the Gulf of Mexico and along the Florida west coast. My doctoral dissertation ? a 10-year study ? was on the Gulf. I've spent hundreds of hours diving along the coast, in the very area affected by this tragedy. I know some of the fish personally.
I've seen the place change over the years before the oil spill through natural disasters such as hurricanes, and through the impact of commercial fishing, oil and gas development since the 1950s, with literally thousands of miles of pipelines established on the sea floor and rigs drilling away in that area. It was already bad news, although there were parts that were in great shape, too: the sperm-whale population was expanding and I have personally witnessed areas of coral reef, deep beyond the sunlit areas, that were healthy and prosperous.
I went out diving in mid-June, right in the middle of the crisis ? initially a little west of where the well head was still spewing out oil at a very fast pace. It was heartbreaking. What was happening was clearly not intentional, but it does reflect carelessness and a lack of attention to things we really should make a requirement: you should know how to deal with a problem in 5,000ft of water before you allow such operations to proceed.
We were seeking to locate a population of whale sharks. The biggest fish in the sea, they feed in an area where small tunas spawn, and we were very fortunate to be there at exactly the moment the fish were spawning ? more than 100 whale sharks gathered. For the next 11 hours, from sun-up until dark, we were in the water with these animals, watching them feed, tagging some with satellite tags, photographing as many as we could, so that we could understand their movements. We were concerned they'd be doomed if they went a little bit east of where we were, right into the heart of the oil spill.
Months later, the reality is that the eco- system has been altered through at least 5m barrels of oil and 2m gallons of dispersant being spilled into the Gulf. How that will alter the natural ecology of the Gulf long-term, we're still unsure. It has changed, and will never go back to what it was.
We haven't, until now, been forced to consider the real cost of cheap energy. The biggest tragedy of all would be if we fail to learn from the experience.
22 April: Iceland's volcanic ash cloud causes chaos.
By Stanley Johnson, travel writer
While the eruption of Eyjafjallaj�kull closed airspace across the north of Europe, my wife and I were among the lucky few who had the experience of their life: brought home on a warship by the British navy.
We were on our way home from the Gal�pagos Islands when the volcano erupted and by a stroke of luck our plane was scheduled to fly to Madrid, the one airport still open. When we arrived there was total paralysis, the airport crammed with people looking disappointed. I thought: there's no point staying here. (The decision paid off; others who didn't leave ended up in Madrid for a week or more.)
We got the last two seats on a bus going across Spain to the port of Santander; after a five-hour journey, we ambled down to the quayside looking for any boat that would take us back home. There we were amazed to see the colossal grey bulk of the second largest ship in the Royal Navy, HMS Albion. It had been sent to Santander not to pick up stragglers like us but 700 British soldiers coming back from Afghanistan. Acting captain John Gardner said they were jolly well going to take on as many as they could, and the soldiers generously gave up their beds for us returning tourists. Later, the captain took me on a tour of inspection, and in the bowels of the ship there they all were, lying on their kit bags.
There were 300 British tourists on board, and the atmosphere couldn't have been better. We bunked up, eight or 12 to a cabin, for two nights; they fed us unbelievably well. Even the Bay of Biscay was glassy calm. As a PR exercise for the navy it couldn't have turned out better.
7 May: The Conservative-Lib Dem coalition is formed.
By Danny Alexander, Treasury Chief Secretary
I was aware that a hung parliament was a greater possibility at this election than it had been for many years. But that was theory, and much more of the Lib Dem's preparation had been focused on the election. Nick Clegg's performance in the leaders' debates was stunning and had a big effect on our campaign.
I finished my count at around 6am and was on a plane to London by 7am ? there wasn't a pause for breath or reflection on the result locally or nationally. We were plunged into a hung parliament and the coalition discussions began. Nick had asked me to lead the team, to be our chief negotiator, in December last year and we had put an awful lot of work into preparing the ground for coalition talks.
That week I was in a bubble ? I wasn't watching the television or reading newspapers. What I have realised since is how much people were glued to their television sets, watching hour by hour, wanting to know what was happening. As for the talks themselves, what was really striking was how with the Conservatives we almost immediately settled into a very good-natured discussion ? the personal chemistry was good. Whereas in the Labour talks, although some wanted them to be successful, others ? such as Ed Balls and Ed Miliband ? clearly did not. So it was a very different atmosphere.
During that week there was a constant risk that my wife would give birth. I remember on the Tuesday, when we were just fleshing out the details, my mobile phone rang. I said to William Hague: "That is my wife ? I'd better take the call and we might have to suspend the talks." In fact my daughter Isla was born 10 days after the government was formed. That was my high point of 2010.
The difference between now and before the election is that I decide things; in opposition I just said things. In the work I've been doing at the Treasury I have had to take some incredibly difficult decisions and I have always been conscious that every number on every page represents someone's job or a service someone relies on. Over the past few months I've got a thicker skin. But I think we made good decisions that will see the country through what has been one of the worst economic positions we've had in modern times.
2 June: Derrick Bird kills 12 people on a shooting rampage.
By Sean King, landlord of the Boot Inn, Cumbria
It was one of the rare lovely days that we had last summer in Eskdale, one of the most beautiful valleys in the Lake District. I received a phone call at the pub asking if I was all right. Harry Berger, who used to be the landlord of the Boot, had been shot in Seascale, and somebody was afraid that it was me.
Soon enough we got a call from the police saying they thought the killer was on his way here, and to keep customers in the pub, keep them away from the windows, and for me to try to get anybody in that I could.
There were people with kids in the beer garden, and they came in straightaway once I told them what was going on. There was no alarmism ? I just said: "Something's gone on in Whitehaven, so as a precaution we're coming in."
It's very popular with walkers round here, so there were plenty of people coming down off the fells, oblivious to it. We had tea and biscuits for them. Or pints. We had everybody in here, and the doors locked. It was tense. A helicopter was directly above us. As far as we knew he was on the loose: we're surrounded by woods, so he could have popped out anywhere. But by that time, he'd already shot himself at the farm up the road. We'd installed extra TVs for the World Cup, so everyone was watching it all on the television, which was how we found out when it was safe to go outside again.
It was tough in Cumbria after last year's floods. Now we're all trying our best to get on with daily life.
18 June: Wayne Rooney implodes at the World Cup.
By Colin Murray, football presenter
Let's face it, this year's World Cup in South Africa wasn't a classic. But there were plenty of fascinating moments. They played with a beach ball, one of the reasons the group games were so dire. Robert Green had a howler against USA ? but soon the list of goalkeeping errors was so long his name almost didn't appear. The French team imploding was hilarious, but my personal highlight was Germany v Argentina in the quarterfinal ? I have a vivid memory of Maradona getting a substitute ready to come on when Germany scored their third, and crying into the sub's back.
The huge moment for England was when Wayne Rooney looked down the camera lens and criticised his own fans for booing him. Everyone knew they had an unsettled camp and this was exhibit A ? a happy footballer doesn't do what Rooney did. Could you imagine Bobby Charlton doing that in 1970 after England were beaten by West Germany?
Culturally, the biggest impression was the contrast of the shanty towns to the newly built stadiums. It reminded me of growing up in Northern Ireland, where the headlines are so different to your daily experience: everywhere I went we met salt-of-the-earth people, who saw hosting the World Cup as a privilege. That's what'll stay with me.
24 August: The final Big Brother.
By Brian Dowling, TV presenter
Everyone is extremely nosy and everybody loves to have an opinion. Big Brother let people bitch with permission. Going back in for the final series after nine years, it was as if I had never left. I had learned, though, how the show highlights everyone's misfortunes. I saw how loud I was, and how arrogant I could appear.
Big Brother not only changed my life, making me more mature, more grounded and more tolerant of other people, but I think it changed Britain, too. It was a show about the good in people, and while it invited us to judge them, you got to know them as people ? brushing their teeth, having dinner ? rather than as "the transsexual", or, in my case, "the homosexual".
It made us redefine fame ? it meant celebrities didn't have to be talented, just interesting. It made us redefine culture, and made us redefine television.
The producers found themselves a cast every year ? a cast of real people, like Jade Goody, to play out a real-life soap opera. It even made us redefine the news ? we got to know these characters whose daily stories became our water-cooler moments.
It was good to finish on a high. And while I don't want anyone to win again (that's my crown, thank you very much), I don't think Big Brother's gone for good.
Every television show has a reality aspect now, and anybody can become a celebrity. Its legacy lives on.
12 September: Lady Gaga dons raw meat.
By Jane Bruton, editor of Grazia
We are huge fans of Lady Gaga at Grazia. What is so, so great about her is that she embraces the theatre of fashion. She isn't interested in looking pretty or sexy ? she's interested in creating huge fashion drama. Readers love how stimulating her style is, how much it frees us all up to try wilder looks.
The meat dress Gaga wore to the VMAs [MTV's Video Music Awards, held in September] was one of those fashion moments that totally stopped us in our tracks. I actually gasped: it was the meaty moon boots that really got me. It was the most commented-upon story on the magazine's website this year; and the comments were polarised. There was wild speculation over what kind of statement she was trying to make; some suggestion that she might have jumped the fashion shark finally, that she was trying too hard to shock? and a load more simply celebrating the wondrousness of Lady Gaga.
What I love about that look is that you get the sense she is only just getting started with her brilliant, bonkers aesthetic. Who knows what she'll do next? I can't wait to find out.
16 September: The Pope comes to Britain.
By Ann Widdecombe, former MP
There was a lot of cynicism before the Pope's visit, but I always believed that it was going to be successful because this pope, unlike his predecessor, hasn't managed to project his personality from behind the walls of St Peter's. People thought he was a hardened traditionalist and a rather dry theologian, and then they saw a very gentle, humorous, kind man and everything changed very quickly.
I was lucky enough to go to every event and they were all memorable, but the beatification of Cardinal Newman in Birmingham's Cofton Park stands out for me, as we're probably going to get our first English saint in 500 years.
I met the Pope himself when he was doing the address to both Houses ? it was extremely brief, a handshake and not much else ? but seeing him close up was a wonderful experience.
One tiny vignette struck me, when I was covering the joint service in Westminster Abbey. Outside I could see two people standing side by side; one had a banner saying: "The Pope is the antichrist," and the other had a banner saying: "We love you Papa more than beans on toast." I thought: "That is a bit of England that we've lost."
This wasn't just about Catholics, it was about British Christianity. At a time when Christians do feel under pressure in this country, a visit from the major world figure for Christianity was hugely reassuring. Everything now depends on how much the church capitalises on that visit and really uses it as a source of encouragement and guidance.
25 September: Ed Miliband beats his brother in the Labour leadership contest.
By Ken Livingstone, former London mayor
I committed myself to Ed Balls early on in the Labour leadership election, when Ed Miliband was still uncertain about whether to stand. My broad view was anyone except David, I'm afraid ? I didn't believe Labour could win the next election unless we had a candidate prepared to say the war in Iraq was wrong.
So I was pleased when Ed announced he was standing, and I wasn't as surprised as some that he was prepared to take on his brother for the prize. The history of the human race is littered with brothers struggling to control the throne. To be born the second brother in a hereditary monarchy is one of the most galling things, and you take any opportunity to upend your older sibling.
I remember saying to Ed Balls at the start of the campaign that whoever stayed in the race to the final ballot would pull it off against David. Any chance David had was ultimately doomed the moment Mandelson started attacking Ed Miliband, really; that was the clincher. In retrospect if Blair and Peter Mandelson hadn't published their books until a month later the result might have gone for David.
Everyone knew it was desperately close when we went up to Manchester for the party conference. We haven't had a close leadership election in 30 years: you've got to go back to Jim Callaghan in 1976 to find a result that wasn't a foregone conclusion.
The candidates find out the result in a small room half an hour before everyone else ? I'd been through the same thing the day before when I'd beaten Oona King in the election for the London mayoral nomination and I can tell you, it's an awkward moment. But the atmosphere in the hall was electrifying. The trade unions and party rank and file had been largely ignored for years and it was a sweet victory for them. It felt like Labour was coming home.
Of course there was sympathy for David. Everybody loves him, and he's a very nice guy. What I find really good about Ed, though, is that he is completely relaxed. He's a bit like John Smith in that way: you take time and make a judgment ? it's not all about stunts. Ed's playing the long game. He knows we're not going to get rid of this government in the next 18 months. It's about laying the foundations to win an election four years away.
4 October: Europe win the Ryder Cup.
By Rory McIlroy, golfer
I'll never forget watching Graeme McDowell play the 16th hole of the Ryder Cup. The fairway was filled with players, all sitting on the grass watching. Aside from the odd whisper everyone was silent, we were all so engulfed in what was happening. Watching "G-Mac" play that hole was more nerve- wracking than any point I'd had to play in the tournament.
Captain Colin Montgomerie's decision to play G-Mac last made absolute sense: he is so good under pressure. I remember Monty going up to him on the 15th fairway and saying: "Look, we need your match to win the Ryder Cup." For him to deal with it and birdie that hole was just incredible. Then, on the 16th, when I saw him roll that 12ft putt in to win the hole I probably leapt 10ft in the air. The celebrations when he finally took the match were crazy ? with all the fans running on to the green there were a few bumps and bruises. But we wouldn't have had it any other way.
It was probably the best experience I've ever had in my golfing career ? and I never thought I would have said that a year ago.
13 October: After 69 days, 33 men are rescued from a collapsed mine in Chile.
By Jeff Hart, drill operator
I was working in Afghanistan, drilling water wells for the US Army, when the San Jos� mine collapsed. When management first rang me and said I had the most experience with this type of hammer and hole span, I thought they were joking around. But [fellow drill operator] Matt Staffel and I managed to put a crew together and flew out to Chile.
To begin with we approached it like any other job, but once we got there the thought of those 33 people beneath our feet changed everything. I had this overwhelming stress, imagining if it was me down there, how I'd get through the day.
There were three drilling operations going on to reach them ? we were Plan B, and we didn't even know how Plan A and C were doing because it wasn't a competition. We were kept away from the media, too, so we had no idea how much international attention there was.
We ate ham and cheese sandwiches every day at the mine, which is fine ? but when you've had a ham and cheese sandwich 15 days in a row, they don't taste that good any more. So now and again we'd go to Camp Hope, where the miners' families got together and cooked for whoever wanted to have a hot meal.
On day 33 of drilling we broke through: that moment was crazy. Matt and I hadn't slept for 48 hours because the drill pipe was so deep that it would have cost us a full day to take it out and change it. So we were tired, but excited, too. We just thought: "Let's get those guys out."
But our crew didn't stay to see the miners come to the surface. We decided this was a story about the miners and their families. I could watch it on television just like millions of people around the world did. So as soon as we got the rig down, we moved to a hotel in Santiago. We thought we'd celebrate and have a drink, but when the rescue capsule came out for the first time, it was very sobering. We just looked at each other; we couldn't believe what we'd done.
I haven't met the miners yet, but we do plan to go back to Chile some time. If nothing else, just to give them a hug.
November: Student protests.
By Bethany Shiner, student protester
I'd travelled from Birmingham to the first of the student protests. These cuts are symptomatic of what lies ahead for generations to come and it's important to voice our concerns as a collective. We began in Trafalgar Square and followed the crowd to Parliament Square. There was a real feeling of positivity in the air. We didn't know we were being "kettled" until it was too late. I called my father, a human-rights lawyer, to tell him what had happened.
We saw two policemen on horses charging the crowds. Then there was a rush ? people, horses, police ? then protesters coming out of the crowds with blood all over them. I started to feel anxious so we decided to leave. We went over to a police line to be told that we needed a different exit to get out. We soon realised we weren't going anywhere any time soon.
It was late afternoon and we were told we wouldn't be released until midnight. There was no food or water and very few medics. I saw a boy, around 18, with his head bleeding. He had been hit with a police baton. The police wouldn't let him out to see a medic, so I shouted that he needed help and we were allowed to bring him through. One medic was treating three young men who had all been hit over the head by batons. These were heavily armed police pitting themselves against students peacefully protesting for their right to an education.
My father was as angry and horrified as I was, we are now taking the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police to court.
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