Hit and run

I spoke too soon. The end of the shift was looming and I was at the station when my phone went. I had a call on my MDT in the car. I wandered out and found the MDT shut down (low power does that). I re-booted the system, which takes forever, and called Control to let them know I wasn't yet rolling to the job because I had no details.

The system restarted as I moved off and it was a call to a RTC at a normally very busy road in Central London, although at this time of the day the rush hour would be getting off to a slow start. The call details also stated "vehicle vs ped. - ?inj"; nothing could be further from the truth.

I arrived at the top of the road in question and found it cordoned by the police. This meant that it was a serious incident, not the 'possibly drunk and has no injuries after bumping lightly into a parked vehicle' that I thought it was going to be. I continued down the road until I got to the scene. There was an ambulance in attendance but I couldn't see the crew or the casualty. Two buses were blocking my access to the area and the bus drivers, who were parked side by side across the entire road, were having a conversation and not paying any attention to my flashing blue lights or my cold stare. I sounded my siren and they looked. A police officer waved one of the buses out of my way and I proceeded around the wrong side of the road to the accident scene.

I parked up and glanced over my shoulder at the road behind me. One of my colleagues was attending to a casualty on the ground. Then I realised what I was seeing. A young woman, in her early twenties, lay in the middle of the road with a large pool of blood around her. She was stripped of her clothing, which was blood-soaked and my colleague was at her head, his crew mate rushing to the ambulance for equipment.

I got out and ran over to them. She was in serious trouble. She had a massive obvious head injury. She lay there and her legs and arms moved in a grotesque slow-motion mime for help. I have no idea whether she understood what was happening to her or not, all I know is that she squeezed my hand once when I spoke to her but didn't respond like that again afterwards.

Someone had hit her hard and had left the scene. A coward with a car as a weapon had wiped this young girl's future out in a split second and didn't have the guts to stay and help her. Nobody witnessed this apparently and she must have been lying in the middle of that road for God knows how long, with the entire left side of her face obliterated and her life bleeding onto the street, until somebody saw her and called for help.

All her personal belongings were strewn around her and we worked frantically on her to keep her alive. Another FRU arrived and the four of us gathered her up in the scoop and got her into the ambulance. I had called for a Delta Alpha (emergency doctor) to attend but it was going to take too long. If this had happened a few hours later, she would have had the benefit of the Helicopter team (HEMS) but she had us and we weren't waiting.

In the ambulance fluids were given and, as well as her more obvious injuries, a left side pneumothorax was identified. An attempt was made to de-compress but it was too difficult to deal with immediately, so it was decompressed successfully at hospital - we use a large bore needle, inserted into the chest to get the air out of the chest cavity - this allows the lung to re-inflate and is a potentially life-saving technique.

She was fighting for her life and continued to breathe, albeit agonally, until she got to hospital. There she was put to sleep and intubated (RSI) so that her breathing could be managed properly. This is what we needed done on scene but there was no time to wait. When I left she was still being worked on and I have no idea whether she will survive. If I was to be honest, I expected her to be dead on scene when I saw the extent of her head injury but miraculously she stayed alive and hung on until she could get the best possible chance of survival at hospital. I will find out what happens to this young woman for you and report back.

My FRU colleague gave me a lift back to the scene (my car was left there whilst I worked with the other paramedic in the ambulance) and I looked at the mess that was left behind. The entire street was cordoned off and no doubt there will be traffic chaos right about now as I'm writing this but I don't care. I am angry that I have, yet again, witnessed the lowest form of human cowardice.

If you are a young driver (especially if you are male), let me tell you something - you can't really drive. You think you can and you will convince yourself that you are the world's best driver but you need years behind the wheel - decades - and you need further training to become a good driver. I don't mean a good fast driver, I'm talking about seeing whilst driving. Ambulance professionals receive weeks of intense training to be able to drive the way we do and a lot of it involves forward thinking and really seeing what is going on as you approach at speed. Even then it is possible to make a stupid mistake. Possible but much less likely. Please don't drive away from the scene of any accident you may cause. Please face the music and help anyone you may have hurt. A world of pain is left behind for everyone involved when you hit and run.

If I find out the driver of the vehicle that destroyed this young woman's life was on a mobile phone I will string him up myself.

I had a lot of other things to say about other jobs tonight but it all seems pale and irrelevant at the moment. I'll catch up later. I'm going to sleep now.

Be safe.