Last July, Crew Manager Kieran Hughes was off duty, at home and was alerted to a report of a member of the public being ran over by a vehicle on the front street at Stanhope. He immediately left the house and ran to the incident where he met with Firefighters Joshua Roberts and Jamie Clarkson, who had also been made aware of the accident.

On arrival, they found a member of the public lying on the ground with severe injuries after being ran over by a vehicle. With no medical assistance present, the three crew members began to assist immediately.

Realizing the extent and severity of the lady’s injuries, the 3 on call firefighters began treatment, using the equipment from the Tri – Responder pack. They applied oxygen therapy and controlled blood flow to try and stabilize the lady whilst they waited for the air ambulance to arrive.

Whilst treating the lady another member of the public began to show signs of severe shock, hyperventilating and was drifting in and out of consciousness. Knowing that they only had limited oxygen Kieran ran to the station, placed a call in to mobilize the Stanhope appliance and took the trauma pack off the appliance for the extra oxygen.

He then ran back down to the scene where, with the help of his colleagues, they administered oxygen and casualty care to the second member of the public. They continued to treat both casualties, whilst Kieran went on to lead the air ambulance crew to the scene.

Chief Fire Officer Stuart Errington who awarded two of the three heroic crew with their commendations earlier today commented, “I am immensely proud of them all, not only did they treat the causalities whilst off duty, but they provided vital lifesaving medical treatment and I have no doubt that the actions of Kieran, Joshua and Jamie prevented a fatality that day.”

*Unfortunately Firefighter Roberts was unable to make todays commendation ceremony. But will receive his certificate at a later date.