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Post by tyrednexited on Aug 19, 2018 20:34:00 GMT
...since I had to call 999, but it happened last night. Unless the weather is really inclement, the current Mrs TnE and myself usually have a 3 to 4 mile walk in the forest, either afternoon or evening depending on other distractions. Well into our return leg we could see a large amount of smoke, and roaring flames. The local estate, Forestry Commission and Country Park boundaries all blur at this fairly remote point, and the location is used to dump all the forest debris (many bales of straw, wood chippings, old fencing and whatever). There is even a charcoal burning oven there. The dumped contents were well alight (too hot to get very close), and the surrounding grassland and woodland were clearly at risk. It's not unknown for the staff to burn stuff here, but not at 7:30pm, not with no-one around, and not so out-of-control. There have been a couple of pretty large fires in the local woodlands over the last few weeks, so we weren't going to ignore it. Having dragged as much of the burning fencing off the grassland as I could, we walked up to the road (phone signal is bad in the forest) and called the Fire Service. We said we would flag the engine down on the road, as the fire site was up one of the gated tracks and not visible from the road. We expected a bit of a wait; there is a fire station in the village, but it used to be manned by retained firemen (you had to be careful walking the jitties when there was a "shout", to avoid being knocked down by a fleet-footed fireman careering towards the station); it's now permanently manned however, and they were with us in less than 5 minutes. To my surprise, in the engine passenger seat (and in charge) was the guy who does my lawns when we're away. We know him (and his parents) well, and also knew he was a fireman (they virtually all have other jobs), but he doesn't (normally) work in the village station (he was filling in for holidays on overtime). We described where the fire was, and then offered to set off back through the paths to ensure they found it. We duly arrived to find them beating the straw out, damping down, and dragging burning fence posts onto the track. I asked if they held keys for the track gates - apparently they used to, but not now, and the lock was a combination one anyway. Anyway, one of the guys guessed the combination first attempt - so don't use the current year for your locks! The fire certainly wasn't accidental, and despite everything being really dry, would have taken some starting (4 and 6 inch square fence posts don't light easily). My suspicion, from the way the ground was burning, is that someone had used an accelerant to start it, and not a huge amount of time before we arrived. I do wonder at the mentality of some people.  |
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Post by Humph on Aug 20, 2018 6:32:21 GMT
If Bruce Willis had found it, he’d have put it out single handed in his vest and with no shoes on.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2018 8:25:25 GMT
Last time I made a 999 call from the mobile (many years ago), the operator passed me through to the Police (after a motorcycle accident in front of me) with my number and rough co-ordinates of where I was.
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Post by bromptonaut on Aug 20, 2018 21:05:39 GMT
Apart form reporting an incipient fracas outside the office last summer last time I called 999 was about 10 years ago. Not for usual fire/police/ambulance but for Mountain Rescue. We were climbing Causey Pike, one of the mountains that dominates Keswick's skyline. Pausing before the final climb to the summit we discussed the mountains already in view to west with a chap well past retiring age who'd arrived after us but made a much better pace up to the rocky knoll of the summit.
Pausing again we heard what we at first thought were farmyard noises from the valley before twigging it was somebody calling for help. Turned out our earlier contact had lost his footing,fallen and suspected he'd dislocated his shoulder. He clearly wasn't going back down under his own steam hence the 999 call. Emergency call handler couldn't triangulate our location but had us 'near Braithwaite' and connected us to Keswick MR team who immediately knew exactly where we were (there's a distinctive gully in the knoll) and said they'd get team out.
Pretty quickly we spotted their All Terrain Landrover on an old mine road across the valley but were equally quickly approached by a female member of the team who'd come from behind the summit. Had been walking in area when she got a 'crash call' and did a fell run round head of valley. She actually recognised us as she'd previously worked at Longthwaite Youth Hostel where we'd stayed on multiple occasions.
Victim was eventually evacuated by helicopter that landed on summit.
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Alanović
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Post by Alanović on Aug 21, 2018 9:25:05 GMT
Couple of years back I had to call 999 when I realised there was a prowler outside my house in the middle of the night. The fuzz arrived in 8 minutes and the guy was still there, apparently had been to a house party and couldn't find his way out of our street to get back to town. Whilst we were waiting for the police he started to knock on our front door. I did not open it. 3am and he apparently thought it was OK to be knocking on strangers' houses to be asking for directions. Tw@.
Another more important and distressing one was calling them to the scene of an RTA where a guy had had a tankslapper on his motorbike and been catapulted about 100 yards down the A329M. He'd been joining the motorway from the Winnersh Triangle slip, Reading bound. I was in the inside lane and I had a car overtaking me, so he opens the throttle and nails it up the inside of me to get in front. As the road then curves gently to the right, he finds he's overdone it and bang. Tankslapper. The missus was pregnant with our first at the time, and in the passenger seat, and damned near had the baby right there. I pull over on the hard shoulder, grab the phone and ring 999 as I run to assist the guy, who I actually assumed to be dead from the impact when he hit the ground, landing in the inside lane. He was unconscious but breathing, amazingly. Had no idea what internal injuries he had so didn't move him. Another biker, who had joined the road in front of him, had seen it happen in their mirror and came running back to help, turns out that was his sister and they were out for a blat together. Ambulance was on the scene pretty quickly, but when PC Plod arrived, he didn't initially believe what had happened, and assumed I'd knocked him off the bike. Until somebody else who had stopped mercifully came over and corroborated. I rang the hospital later that day to check on the biker, he had survived but had significant damage to his shoulder and thigh if I recall correctly. Lucky bloke. I heard nothing about it again from the bizzies, so I expect once they took his statement he admitted it was his own stupidity, I think he was just trying to keep up with his sister.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2018 14:30:00 GMT
>>I think he was just trying to keep up with his sister.
The man's a fool. My sister is still a raging nutter on a bike, you'd get killed trying to keep up with her.
Many years ago I was driving to a surf competition on New Years Day at it was early morning. I was probably the only person both awake and sober within a 100 miles. I was driving up the A34 pulling a trailer with all my kit and the road was lethally slippery and was somewhere between Winchester and the A303.
I could see a car upside down in the ditch on the opposite carriageway, I was driving pretty slowly, and was thinking to myself that had properly happened after a NY party.
As I got closer I could see the lights were still on and bright, meaning it couldn't have happened that long ago. As I get even closer I realised the engine was running and it had just happened.
I stopped as quickly as I could, slipped and slid my way across skinning both shins on the central barrier as I went and there was a woman upside down in the drivers seat, and a baby upside down in the child seat in the back.
Not a soul around and this is the days before mobile phones. Though not long before.
I got the baby first into my car and was then struggling to get the woman out of the car, which smelled heavily of petrol.
A gritter lorry came passed, stopped and used his radio to call back to his depot saying that they would call the police.
I had barely got the woman across to my car when two police cars turned up. 10 - 15 minutes I guess. One from each direction. I was dead impressed, though the policeman in charge was somewhat of an arse.
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Post by tyrednexited on Aug 21, 2018 16:50:58 GMT
I think the previous time I personally called 999 was also for an overturned car (Though a walking colleague called the ambulance for the victim of a dog attack we witnessed early last year).
It would have been early 1984, somewhere between Whitchurch and Overton in Shropshire, and very late on a Friday night heading to Snowdonia for a weekend's climbing and walking. There was no other traffic about, and I was "moving" when we spotted a strange light filtering round the corner ahead. I hit the brakes, and came to a halt a reasonable distance from a car in the middle of the road, facing us, headlights full on and entirely upside-down on its roof.
Given the lights being on, I got out rather expecting to find the occupants still in there, but it was in fact empty, with no-one in sight. Again, this was pre-mobile phone days, and as there were no houses in sight, we drove back some distance to a farm we'd passed and used their phone to call the police. Evidently, the driver had walked in the opposite direction, as he had just phoned in from somewhere else. We decided to return to the vehicle and provide some advanced warning to traffic, but it took a patrol car only a matter of minutes to arrive, so we left the PC to it (with a little difficulty manoeuvring past).
A few things about this story. At the end of the previous year, myself and the soon-to-be Mrs nE had spent some of September in Norway, touring by train. British registered cars were not a common sight, but at one of our overnight stops we noted a brand-new Toyota Corolla (A-reg) which was joined by another, and then another, and then....well, you get the drift. They were all consecutively registered. It rapidly dawned on us that we were in the middle of the British motoring press testing the new Corolla in the exciting surroundings of Norway.
Now, the Corolla on its roof was one of the series that we had seen in Norway! I could remember the registration number (and funnily enough, still can now; I checked MOT History by remembered registration number, and it resolved to a Corolla)
It also brings home how much of a difference mobile 'phones have made since their introduction.
I also remember the previous time; having spotted an elderly woman wearing but a nightdress walking along Portman Road in Reading late at night, I stopped at the next 'phone box and called the police. Portman Road wasn't (at least at that time) much of a location for pedestrians of any kind, and definitely not late at night, but it was at the back of Battle Hospital, so I suspected an 'escapee'.
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Alanović
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Post by Alanović on Aug 22, 2018 8:56:41 GMT
Portman Road is like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon these days. Majestic Wildebeest (not that one), all that.
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Post by tyrednexited on Aug 22, 2018 9:08:02 GMT
Though I can still just about find my way around, Reading has changed an awful lot since I lived there (well, it was 40 years ago!).
Cow Lane and Portman Road used to be my route through from Caversham (Heights) to friends at Tilehurst.
...and speaking of which, my daughter is part-way through buying a house in the latter, so I suspect I shall be getting to know the area better again.
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Alanović
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Post by Alanović on Aug 22, 2018 9:27:48 GMT
The project to replace the Cow Lane bridges is finally nearing completion, soon we shall be speeding through in both directions without traffic lights. The hospital is now flats and a Tesco as I'm sure you're aware. If you ever need somewhere to empty your chemical toilet on the way through Caversham Heights, sod off and go somewhere else.
;-)
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Post by tyrednexited on Aug 22, 2018 10:40:33 GMT
If you ever need somewhere to empty your chemical toilet on the way through Caversham Heights, sod off and go somewhere else. ....I knew things had gone downhill around there over the years, but is it now full?........  |
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