Ferguson, a father of two, was at the airport to pick up his parents. He initially thought it was a road-rage incident. But it soon became evident to him that “this was no angry motorist” when one of the two occupants—believed to be Kafeel Ahmed—got out and set himself ablaze.

His colleague Sgt Torquil Campbell, meanwhile, tackled the SUV’s other occupant—said to be the Iraqi doctor Bilal Abdulla. Ferguson sprayed the man believed to be Kafeel with a fire extinguisher.

“He was well ablaze, clothing, hair, skin, and from the attitude he was in, lying on his back, there was a kind of resignation about him, as if he had resigned himself to death,” Ferguson is quoted as saying in The Daily Telegraph.

Ferguson recounted that the blazing man, who had fallen, got a “second wind” and started “staggering around the road in a sort of daze, punching wildly at anyone that came near him...”.

He says he then aimed the extinguisher in his eyes, while Sgt Campbell sprayed CS gas at him.

“It never entered my consciousness to walk away from the guy. I would have been failing in my duty.

Ferguson said he does not see himself as a hero. In fact, both he and Campbell have said that they reacted instinctively to protect the public as any British policeman would.

Sgt Campbell, also a father-of-two, said he saw a man running toward him aggressively, trying to block his path to the car and “lashing out with his fists”.

He added: “I knew his intention was to keep me back from the vehicle. He ran back to the vehicle and tried to open the back hatch of the Jeep Cherokee.

“I thought, ‘What is in the vehicle?’, because at that time I could hear popping and banging coming from the vehicle. By that time I was already sending out an emergency signal on my radio.

He said he realised that he was dealing with a terrorist attack when the second man who was on fire came towards him.

“It was hard to comprehend but I just had to accept the fact that terrorism had arrived at Glasgow airport,” he added.