And that makes a hat-trick!

Date: 15th February 2008
Time: 1615
Type: RTC
Address: Leisure Way, Lowestoft (Tesco Petrol Station)
Initial Attendance: Normanhurst 05, 02 and 01

That’s the third RTC I’ve been to this week! I haven’t posted details of the one we attended on Wednesday – barely half a mile from the station. Roof off, spine board – the works…

Anyway, back to today.

We’d been called in on standby for a house fire in the south of the town (Ladder 1, Red Watch) and Clifton 01. Andy ‘Cheesey’ Armes had just got on the phone to Control to see if we could be dismissed only to be told of the RTC and that all three pumps from Normanshurst would be going.
To tell you the truth I thought Cheesey was winding us up, even when he started to get his fire kit on. But, sure enough, about 30 seconds later the bells went and all three lights came up and we’re off!

I was driving Ladder 2 with Mel Buck in charge and Al Soards and Greg Osborn in the back. Dennis had taken the PRT (Normanshurst 05) with Cheesey driving and Rudi Mann and Rachel ‘Princess’ O’Connell (I have checked…) – both from Red Watch – and Ben ‘Horney Ben’ Horne in the back.

It only takes a couple of minutes to get to Tesco’s and we were confronted by a car that had gone straight at some substantial bollards that presently block off a piece of unused roadway. The car had bent the bollards to the floor and it had come to rest a few feet beyond. The driver was out of the vehicle and was subsequently taken into custody by the boys in blue. He wasn’t too keen on the idea but they persuaded him that was what he wanted to do…

The car was stabilised and glass management done before moving on to removing the roof. The female front seat passenger was then removed on the spine board and off to hospital. Just for good measure we also removed the bollards by using our airbags to lift them from their holes. These bags can be inflated steadily from a BA cylinder and can be used to lift heavy objects – lorries etc. So they made light work of loosening the bollards.

Job done.

A good team effort, as usual, from all the guys (and gal) at Normanshurst…