A “SECRET hero” who helped foil the Glasgow Airport terror attack by tackling a suicide bomber has died aged 59.
Stephen Clarkson — who took down Kafeel Ahmed, 28, after the jihadist set himself on fire — lost a five-month battle with a rare cancer.
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His grieving brother David, 62, paid tribute to the brave builder, who always played down his part in stopping an explosion at the terminal on June 30, 2007.
He told The Scottish Sun: “Stevie always put everybody else ahead of himself. He worked with me for years fitting driveways and I would tell clients my brother was one of the Glasgow Airport heroes.
“But he’d get embarrassed and ask me not to tell anybody. I was so proud of him and it won us loads of business.
“I think that he was proud too — but he’d never let on.”
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Stephen was awarded the Queen’s Gallantry Medal for his courage 18 years ago, when he battered maniac Ahmed as he tried to open a Jeep’s boot crammed with gas cylinders and petrol cans after it had been crashed into the airport building.
He passed away last Saturday in Glasgow’s Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice, just two miles from his home in the city’s Penilee district.
Stephen had been diagnosed last November with cholangiocarcinoma, which affects bile ducts.
Only 22 people per million are diagnosed each year in the UK.
One of five brothers, Stephen was known for his wicked sense of humour, love of Oasis, Rangers and his German Shepherd Goda — plus flutters on the football and horses.
David recalled: “When Stevie left his house for the last time, he was really very ill. The paramedics were worried about even getting him down the stairs and to the hospice.
“But as they were carrying him out, he piped up, ‘I need a fag.’
“And he told us he wanted us to put a line on a horse at the bookies for him.
“One time he won £500 on a race by picking a horse with a name he liked — it was Secret Hero.”
Stephen achieved his unwanted fame after decking terrorist Ahmed with a forearm smash to the chest.
The crazed fanatic had doused himself in petrol and set it alight before trying to ignite his motor’s lethal cargo outside the travel hub.
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The 6ft 1in Glaswegian intervened to help cops battling to stop the Indian-born engineer, who died from his burns a month later.
Stephen was even inadvertently pepper-sprayed by police during the terrifying incident.
Ahmed’s accomplice was Bilal Abdullah, 44, a doctor at nearby Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley.
The pair had tried, and failed, to set off two car bombs in central London the night before. Iraqi medic Abdullah was caged for at least 32 years in 2008 after being convicted of conspiracy to murder.
David told how his brother had only gone to the terminal that day to pick up relatives returning from holiday.
“It’s just the kind of man he was — a real hero.”
He explained: “We’d been out working when he remembered he had to get to the airport. He told me he’d be 30 minutes but called me quite a bit later.
“Stevie told me, ‘I’m not sure I’m going to make it back — I think I’m just after taking out a suicide bomber.’”
Stephen was later honoured along with three other civilians who helped tackle the terrorists — Alex McIlveen, Michael Kerr and John ‘Smeato’ Smeaton.
But it wasn’t his only display of bravery. Two years earlier he had earned a police commendation for saving a man from plunging 100ft off Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh.
David said: “He heard shouting and looked over the edge and saw a guy clinging on for dear life.
“Stevie got pals to hold his feet and dangled down to reach the man and pull him to safety.
“Another time Stevie ran into a burning flat to try to save one of his neighbours. and he climbed into a frozen pond in a park to pull out an old lady’s wee dog.
“But he’d never talk much about any of these things. It’s just the kind of man he was — a real hero.”
