UK Coroner Rules 29-Year-Old Could Have Been Saved: Ambulance Call Handler's 13-Minute Delay in Reporting a Fire Left Her Trapped in a Burning Car
CHESHIRE, England, Nov. 11 — An inquest at Cheshire Coroner's Court has concluded that a 29-year-old woman who was trapped in her car after a head-on crash could have been rescued, but was burned alive because an ambulance call handler delayed telling the fire service that a vehicle was on fire, a delay of about 13 minutes.
The woman, Amanda Edwards, was a nursery worker from Runcorn who was driving to work on the morning of April 13 when 59-year-old Andrew Dean hit her head-on in Frodsham, Cheshire. Dean was driving on the wrong side of the road at an estimated 67 to 76 mph in a 50-mph zone, and the coroner found his manner of driving was likely contributed to by alcohol. Fuel leaking from Dean's Mini Cooper caught fire and the flames spread to Edwards's Vauxhall Corsa. She survived the impact and was seen breathing, but was unconscious and trapped, while bystanders made what the coroner called a valiant effort to rescue the drivers.
The inquest heard that North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) call handler Jennifer Campbell admitted in a statement that she was told immediately that there was a fire underneath one of the vehicles, but prioritised triaging the two patients over the phone instead of notifying the outbound desk, which would have alerted the fire brigade. The first call was taken at 8:15 a.m.; the incident was not classified as category 1 until 8:27 a.m., and the fire service was not alerted until 8:31 a.m. Senior coroner Victoria Davies ruled that a category 1 classification could have been issued within a minute of the call and that the outbound desk should have been told about the fire by 8:18 a.m. Had the brigade been alerted at the proper time, crews could have been on scene at about 8:34 a.m. to suppress the flames and attempt a rescue; they in fact arrived at 8:46 a.m., 31 minutes after the first call.
The coroner attributed the error to a lack of experience and confidence, a reluctance to seek help, and a mistaken belief that triage should come first, and concluded that the delay precluded any possibility of rescuing Edwards from the fire.
(Source: Cheshire Coroner's Court)
Source: Cheshire Coroner's Court
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：英国西北救护服务（NWAS）的一辆救护车（资料图）。CC BY-SA 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: An ambulance of the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) in England (file photo). CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
