Episode 7 Real Rescues

Today on Real Rescues,

an emergency on the River Thames.

The RNLI lifeboat is heading out to a sinking boat.

Four people are on board and in danger...

..a young tennis talent is hurt after a head-on smash at 60mph.

The woman's grandfather is shocked to see her crumpled car...

..but looking at this, she's been very lucky.

Look at the state of this.

..and firefighters battle to stop a fire which is threatening

to move into a roof and spread next door.

Richie?

Covering jet round the back.

Hello, and welcome to Real Rescues,

the series which features some of the most difficult

and dramatic rescues carried out by the emergency services.

They all start with a 999 call picked up at a police control room

like this one, or by ambulance, coastguard or fire and rescue.

When there's an emergency on the River Thames,

one of the key resources for the coastguard

is provided by the lifeboat charity, the RNLI.

They have four stations on the Thames

and are amongst the busiest in the UK.

RNLI's Tower Station on the River Thames.

It's a hot summer's day,

the sort of day when people flock to the river...

ALARM RINGS ..and emergencies happen.

It's mid-afternoon when a 999 call

comes into the coastguard from a mobile.

THEY CALL OUT INSTRUCTIONS

It's the worst possible emergency. A vessel is going down.

One of the rescuers en route

is full-time RNLI crewman Chris Walker.

We knew that we had a boat that was sinking

and the location of it was down by the Millennium Footbridge,

outbound of the station on the Thames.

We also knew that there were four people on board

and that was all the information we had at that time.

The sinking boat is on the other side of Blackfriars Bridge.

It's high tide, the river is fast-running,

but the lifeboat is one of the quickest in the RNLI fleet.

It's on scene in just a couple of minutes.

As we came through the arches at Blackfriars Bridge,

we could see the boat in the distance,

quite close to the north shore.

Still relatively deep water

and it had been massively affected by the passing tide.

As they approach, the lifeboat crew kill their engine to limit the wash.

The closer we got, we noticed that the boat

was getting lower and lower in the water.

The small, wooden speedboat is low in the water.

Two young women are crouched on the bow,

trying to keep the stern from going under.

As we got alongside the boat,

it was fairly evident that we had to get them off very, very quickly.

The first woman is safely hauled on board.

The group aren't wearing lifejackets.

The crew know that if anyone falls into the water now,

it could be disastrous.

The Thames, it's not a safe place at all.

There are undercurrents, there's very, very fast-flowing tide.

The water itself is not exactly the healthiest of water

to go swimming in, and also the temperature itself.

When you go into that water not prepared,

then you can be affected by cold shock.

As we got hold of the owner, he stepped onto the lifeboat

and as his foot left his own boat, it was starting to get wet

as his boat disappeared underneath the water.

This sort of service is a very classic in-the-nick-of-time service.

Had we been even ten seconds later,

we imagine that boat would have taken on enough water

to capsize it and then all four people would have been in the water.

With the boat quickly submerging, the lifeboat crew

need to manoeuvre upstream of the wreckage to tie it to the riverbank.

If the debris floats free,

it could become a hazard to shipping in the Thames.

Now that we've got the crew of the vessel on board our lifeboat,

our concern is, now that they are safe,

we have to make sure that other river users are safe,

so we grabbed hold of the painter from the front of the boat,

that's the line that comes off the front,

tied that onto one of the chains on the embankment wall itself

to stop their boat actually drifting into the way of other shipping

and becoming a hazard to that shipping.

Once we'd secured that boat, our colleagues in the police boat,

the fire boat and also the Port of London Authority,

they dealt with any flotsam and jetsam and the vessel itself,

which meant that we could get lifejackets onto the casualties

and take them back to the lifeboat station

to make sure that they're safe and well.

By now, the shock is beginning to hit the four friends.

The next stop is Tower Station,

where the group will be checked over and briefed about river safety.

The risk that would have been presented to them,

being in the water in such a heavily industrial area

with so much commercial traffic, is just unthinkable.

Later, the crew are called to a party-goer in distress.

She's trodden on some glass and it's embedded in her heel.

You're probably going to need to go to hospital for them

to have a look at it and maybe give it some stitches.

She's not going anywhere on foot,

so there's only one way to get her on her way to hospital.

A fire engine is weaving through the busy city-centre streets.

A house is on fire.

Green Watch don't know how serious, but in the distance, there's smoke.

Two men have made it safely out of the house.

Everyone's out! Smoke is coming from an upstairs bedroom window.

Watch manager Sean Foster has to get as much information

as he possibly can as quickly as he can.

Do you know where all the electrics are?

Under the stairs, OK. And what's on fire?

Your cupboard? And what was in there?

You haven't got any gas cylinders, anything like that, no?

Adie, can we have entry control?

If you boys want to start up, electrics have not been isolated.

They're under the stairs. Middle bedroom.

I don't know what's on fire.

He seems to think rubbish.

Sean heads round the back.

He finds even more smoke pouring out of the upstairs.

Right, get a jet round here.

Richie? Covering jet round the back.

The fire is progressing fast.

In the bedroom, Rich?

Yeah, I see it.

Right, OK.

The house's occupants are called to safety.

Thick smoke is now pouring out of the front of the house as well.

Stan, it's going quite well.

The only way to knock back the flames is from inside.

Two crew go in wearing breathing apparatus.

Adie?

Feed out some more reel.

The fight is on to stop the fire moving into the roof.

That will put the neighbouring house in danger.

Overseeing operations is tactical advisor Mark Raven.

While the breathing apparatus team is doing all they can on the inside,

Rich Green is tackling the flames from the outside.

He has to stop the flames moving to the roof

while his crewmates work below.

There's a team in the bedroom...

..fighting the fire,

and all the hot gasses are coming out the window,

so I'm just cooling those hot gasses so it doesn't catch the roof alight.

Keep your BA on. Charlie, if you want to come round the front...

It's going well out the front.

As soon as I've got more personnel, I may put you in.

The fire chiefs have called for backup,

in case the fire moves to the next house.

But, in the nick of time, an update comes over the radio

to firefighter Adie Knight - inside, they're winning the battle.

Yeah, it's died out there just fine.

The PPV is a powerful fan which firefighters can only use

once the flames are out.

The fan will push the thick, hot gasses out of the building.

Not at the moment. If they can just keep it under control...

Yeah, I need to find out a bit more about the history of the fire. OK.

They've cleared the house of smoke.

It's safe for watch manager Sean to take a look inside.

Adrian Cobb was one of the firefighters inside the house.

Small bedroom, but the fire was going well.

Nice and warm.

Smoke had spread to the other bedroom and the bathroom,

and the landing and stairs were quite heavily smoke-logged,

but, once we worked out where the fire actually was,

it didn't take long to knock down.

And the fan came on, blew the smoke away,

and it's much easier from then on.

The building is owned by a housing association.

It's equipped with all the correct fire safety measures,

which have helped to limit the spread of the flames.

It has fire standards similar to a hotel,

so it has fire doors and things and they were closed,

so the fire was contained within the room of origin.

Early reports suggest that the fire was caused

by a discarded burning cigarette.

Fortunately, most of the house has been saved.

The job is done, and Green Watch can pack up and head back to base.

If you've been witness to a domestic dispute, you'll know

that it's a very terrifying, very upsetting situation.

If you've been involved with one, it can be very frightening

and upsetting, and the police take it very seriously.

But what happens when that domestic dispute

starts to impinge on the safety of others?

Brigitte, here, can tell us about a call, if...

Are you on a call, or are you all right?

No, I'm fine. Just clear, OK.

So, yeah, tell us about this domestic

that wasn't in a house, was it?

No, it was in the middle of a motorway.

Partner and his girlfriend were having an argument,

and she decided to ring 999 because he was driving so dangerously

and erratically that she was worried about her safety

and the safety of her two children that were in the back seat.

OK, so they're still at speed... Yep. ..and getting worse.

And getting worse. He was driving erratically,

undertaking other people,

other vehicles, on the motorway,

so it's just an absolute nightmare for herself,

because, again, she's a moving target, a moving location,

and she's highly distressed. Highly distressed.

OK, presumably, the first thing you've got to do

is find out where she is.

Find out where she is - hard on a motorway as it is,

but at the same time she was saying whereabouts she was going to

and going from, so we got a good location and, obviously,

whilst I'm on the phone to her

she wanted to pull over on the hard shoulder,

but what I was doing was actually looking at the road policing units,

making them all aware of where she was going to be heading up towards,

so that we could look at maybe putting them over

to a safer location. She wanted to stop on the hard shoulder,

just wanted to get out of the car.

It's not a safe location to do that, so, without actually giving him

too much information that we were going to be making our way there...

Why don't you say, "We've got cars coming toward you"?

It might escalate. It might prompt him to have a panic reaction.

Take evasive action or something?

Take evasive action. So whilst you're on the phone to them,

we're trying to get the units to come up behind them

so that they can pull them over in a safer environment.

So, the first thing he knows, there's cars around him. Yep.

And we're just pulling him over to a safer location,

so off of a slip road, so that it's off of the motorway,

off of the hard shoulder, cos it's a dangerous location.

But, again, she wasn't told that over the telephone, because, again,

not to prompt the reaction, just in case other road users...

At which point it just becomes a standard domestic,

where you've just got to separate the parties.

Yes, and then work out who's at fault,

what are the offences that have been committed. Yeah.

That's what we have to do.

I never thought about that, but, of course, people do have rows in cars,

but it's not a safe place to do it, that's for sure.

Thank you very much. That's OK.

SIRENS WAIL

It's 7pm, and Thames Valley traffic cops Garry Fortnum

and Ray McNaught are responding to an emergency call.

Just had a report of a two-vehicle injury collision

on the road from Wing to Aylesbury.

When they reach the scene, there are actually four cars involved.

Two have left the road.

One is a total wreck...

..and the other is completely unscathed.

Broken-down vehicle here.

This car swerves out to come round it, hits oncoming car.

The last car in the hedge sees all this happening in front of it

and just exits stage left, not colliding with anything,

but puts the car in the hedge to escape being involved.

This is a single-carriageway road with a 60mph limit.

It's been a high-impact collision,

and the black car has taken the full force of the smash.

The driver, Claudia Marsala, was on her way out to dinner with friends,

but she's ended up in the back of an ambulance on a spinal board.

Her granddad Vic has arrived and can't believe the damage to the car.

Looking at this, she's been lucky.

Very lucky. Look at the state of this.

She's just got herself a four-year tennis scholarship in Alabama

and we're flying out Friday morning.

Great timing. At least she's not too badly injured, by the look of it.

Not sure about the left leg, but, looking at this,

God knows how she got out of it.

I really don't.

Surname, please. Surname? Marsala.

The main concern is young tennis player Claudia,

who's still in shock.

There's a worry her injuries may affect her burgeoning career.

Ray is determined to keep her spirits up.

You wanted a new car, Claudia, didn't you?

Oh, yeah, you're supposed to be the next...

Who's the... Who's a famous tennis player? British tennis player?

Robson, isn't it?

Laura Robson. Do you know her?

Oh, wow, there you go! You just name-dropped!

Can we just have a couple of autographs while we're here?

Yeah, I'm going to get your autograph in a minute. Maybe not today, but...

You're ahead of the game! Yeah.

Somehow, Claudia's escaped any serious injuries,

but her leg and head will need checking in hospital.

It's just three days before she's due to fly out to the US.

I think she's just worried that... She's a young girl,

she's been involved in an accident. She's just a bit worried.

But she's going to the hospital now,

Stoke Mandeville. I'll arrange to go and see her in a few days' time.

Ray isn't sure why Claudia didn't react in time

when coming around the bend.

Unfortunately, this lady here has broken down on the side of the road.

It's on a slight bend, but she's nearly all off the road.

She's only got one set of wheels on the road.

Lots of vehicles have managed to pass her, even large lorries.

She was sat in her car, heard some screeching from behind,

some brakes being locked up.

Unfortunately, the black car behind us

we believe has tried to come past her

when another vehicle was coming the other way,

and there's been a collision.

Lots of other cars have managed to get by,

so why didn't that one get by?

We'll be looking into that.

It's a massive clear-up job,

and, as night falls, they finally pull the BMW from the bushes.

Ray can't believe how anyone survived this smash.

It was lucky there weren't any big oak trees in there and stuff.

Good God.

I think the smaller trees have just cushioned him as he's just went off.

Especially if he's been coming through at 60, or 55-60.

I think because the car's obviously so well built, it's a new car,

it's got lots of safety features on it.

Most of the impact has been taken by the engine compartment,

and that's saved the driver from having any sort of serious injuries.

If it had been a smaller car,

there would have been less protection.

I mean, there would have been a lot more damage.

With the black one...

in a way, it's very fortunate the young lady has swerved

to her right a little bit

and the BMW has hit the side of her,

and that's lessened the impact into her car.

If it had been a head-on collision between both cars,

I suspect we'd be looking at quite serious injuries.

There's just a few loose ends to tie up

before they can head back to base.

That's us done now. We're getting the recovery vehicles out.

They're going back to Milton Keynes, a recovery depot there,

and we'll get both ends of the road open to the traffic,

which probably won't be that much at this time of night.

We can get going and I think it's our tea time now.

Still to come on Real Rescues...

..the insect that caused this road accident.

The driver tells police how he lost control at the wheel.

The van driver, who's sitting on the floor, came straight up to me

and he said, "It was my fault.

"A bee came in my window and I flinched, and I swerved,

"and I've hit the car coming the other way."

And Burton the kitten proves he's not such a cool cat

when he gets himself trapped behind a freezer.

CAT MEOWS

Emergency care practitioner Julian Wensley-Smith is heading up the M3.

We're just going off to Chandler's Ford,

just on the outskirts of Southampton.

A 999 call's come in for a man, apparently in his 70s,

with diabetic-related issues, so we're just sort of fighting our way

through the traffic at the moment down the motorway.

SIREN WAILS Should be there in a few minutes.

Doesn't take too long to get there.

Hello? Julian arrives to find Harry, a diabetic of 25 years,

who is breathing but unresponsive.

His wife Rosemary dialled 999.

What's his health been like over the past week? Any coughs, cold, or..?

No. And he's been up to speed on all his medications as prescribed? Yes.

So all the normal routine? Yeah.

Nothing unusual? No.

Harry, that's just a bit of oxygen.

Can you talk to me, Harry? Hello?

You're not feeling 100%, are you?

No, OK.

Just testing Harry's blood sugars at the moment. We know he's a diabetic.

He's got all sorts of other things going on as well.

He is responding to me when I'm speaking to him,

but he's not responding as well as I'd like him to.

Just a matter of doing all his clinical -

little scratch coming, Harry -

doing all his clinical observations first,

to get an idea of what's going on.

And although it's likely his sugar levels are low, we've got

to make sure there's nothing else going on that we're missing.

It's important not to be blinkered and just assume it's diabetes.

So we'll just give him a thorough check through

and see if we can find out what it is.

Julian's initial suspicions are correct.

His sugar levels are low,

and ordinarily we'd try to get somebody to eat something

in the first instance,

because it's the easiest way of getting the sugar levels back up.

So what I'm going to do is just pop up a drip with some glucose in it,

and hopefully we'll just bring him round

in a slow and controlled fashion.

Glucose is a natural energy source

which should raise Harry's sugar levels and consciousness.

Harry, you're just going to feel a scratch in your arm.

Julian needs to administer the glucose via a drip.

It should have an immediate effect.

Well done, you. Look at that - you didn't even flinch. Good man.

Once Harry's a bit more alert and a bit more with us,

we can get him to take on some food

and some carbohydrates that are going to help sustain his sugar levels.

It's still a bit of a mystery, really.

Harry's not one of these people

that ordinarily has problems with his diabetes so, at the moment,

it's a bit of a mystery as to why this has happened.

It only takes a couple of minutes for the glucose to work its magic

and soon Harry is much more alert.

How are we doing, Harry?

How are you feeling?

You able to speak to me?

MUFFLED: Not too bad. Not too bad.

Had better days, haven't you, I guess?

Yeah. Yeah. That's it.

Your job at the moment is just to sit there and look good, all right?

You feeling better? A bit better?

How you feeling? I think so. Yeah, I think so.

Were you aware of my presence when I arrived? Were you aware of me?

I saw you come in. Yep.

And that was all.

That was all, OK.

I don't know what you've been doing. You don't know what I've been up to?

Fine, OK. Do you remember me popping a needle in your arm?

Yeah, you said there'll be like...

Yeah.

..a slight scratch. Yeah, I know.

It's such a lie, isn't it? It's more than just a slight scratch.

I didn't even feel it.

OK.

Your sugar levels were a bit low today...

Most diabetics' blood sugar levels are between five and seven.

Harry's are dangerously below that.

Harry, why do you think that your sugars may have dropped down to two?

I don't know. No.

You haven't done anything, have you? It happens.

Harry seems to have made a really good recovery,

so we've got his sugars up.

His wife is now just making him a cheese sandwich,

so everything's looking good.

Harry tells me that his sugars yo-yo anyway.

Probably refer him back to the GP just so they're aware

and then they can decide where we need to go from there.

Harry seems to be usually in pretty good control of things,

so it's a bit unusual, really.

But we'll refer him on.

Julian waits a few minutes, then tests Harry

to see if his levels have improved.

Here we go, scratch.

It's still low, Harry. It's 3.9.

Oh, it's gone back up.

It's coming up, so we'll give it another few minutes

and we'll test it again.

But I'd certainly like to see it going above five before I leave.

So is that all right?

That's all right. We'll aim for that.

But Harry's not out of danger.

Just moments after eating a sandwich,

his blood sugar levels suddenly drop again.

Nope. Nope? Going down.

Eh?! It's going down.

3.4.

I've got to be honest - your sugar levels were two. Yeah.

I've given you a fair whack of glucose. Yeah.

You've had a good-sized cheese sandwich, a glass of milk. Yeah.

Your sugar levels should be continuing to be going up.

They've gone up a bit,

but not an awful lot considering everything you've had.

Now they're coming back down again.

That's not right. That's not what we're used to seeing.

That's not normal. No, it's not.

Pretty abnormal. No.

Which would suggest to me that maybe there's something going on

that needs further investigation.

It's not what Harry wants to hear.

I'd like just to pop you up to hospital and let them have a look

at you, actually. If I'm honest with you. I'd prefer not to go. Hmm.

It's a big inconvenience, I understand,

but the Ambulance Service pay me to keep patients out of hospital,

so when I'm saying I think you need to go in,

I'm saying it for good reason.

We'll pop you in the front up here, if that's all right.

So, reluctantly, Harry is off to hospital,

but Julian knows that there's no point in taking any risks

with his fluctuating blood sugar levels.

The danger was, if we walked out the house and left Harry there,

if they'd continued to decrease again,

we'd probably end up in exactly the same position

we found ourselves in earlier when Mrs Cowan made the 999 call, so...

Whether there's an underlying issue going on, not too sure,

so we've brought him up to the hospital.

They're going to run some blood tests on him, see what's going on,

and then hopefully they can get him back home ASAP.

We'll have more news later.

Traffic cops Mike Sapwell

and Ian Stevens are racing through the streets of Milton Keynes.

What we're going to is a report of a car-versus-van injury accident.

I don't know any more details than that, actually.

We'll see what we've got when we get there.

Ian has been to the site of this accident many times before.

He knows it could be a bad one.

The road we're going to, it's a national speed limit,

single-carriageway road.

Because people are used to driving on dual carriageways

in Milton Keynes, sometimes people get confused

and think they're still on a dual carriageway

and go to the wrong side of the road.

As a result, we get quite serious collisions on this section.

Oh, Christ.

A van has clipped the side of an oncoming car.

According to the driver,

he lost control after a freak event in the car.

The van driver, who's sitting on the floor, came straight up to me

and he said, "It was my fault.

"A bee came in my window and I flinched and I swerved

"and I've hit the car coming the other way."

The witnesses say that the van was on the wrong side of the road.

What happened, then?

So, pretty much, the car's clipped the kerb. It's just... The van?

Yeah, that's it.

It's just gone, lifted in the air, taken out the sign and...

The sign went flying.

I was looking at the road

and I just saw the van unnaturally swerve straight into it,

like it hit something and then it hit the kerb and bits went flying.

It was pretty much, we had the best view of it.

We were just looking over here as well.

We clocked the kids' seats in the back and we just panicked.

It was heart-stopping. It was unbelievable.

The driver of the other car is in the back of the ambulance.

She's badly shaken, but has escaped injury.

Luckily, her children weren't in the car with her.

He came straight at you, yeah.

No, it's all right. It must have been horrendously shocking for you.

You didn't probably have a lot of time to do that.

She's got bruising

caused by deceleration,

I suppose, caused by the seatbelt going from right to left.

In shock, really.

She wasn't expecting a big white van to come to her side of the road.

Could be worse.

With no serious injuries to either party,

Mike can concentrate on gathering evidence and witness statements,

but before he can interview the van driver,

there's an interesting development.

You're joking me.

Was there really?

I'll give you one for that.

The driver is claiming that he's lost control of the vehicle

because there was a bee flying around in his cab.

It's the first I've ever heard it in all the years I've done the job

and I was a little bit sceptical.

However, as I approached the van, the driver was pointing out

that there is in fact a dead bumblebee in front of the van, so...

A moment's distraction has resulted in a serious crash.

Somehow, both drivers have escaped injury, protected by their cars.

In interview, he said that bees freak him out.

Spiders freak a lot of people out,

bees freak a lot of people out, as do wasps.

We are fight-or-flight animals.

We will either run away from an incident

or we will fight our way out of it.

In this case,

without thinking, he's reacted to the bee's presence...

..and it's caused him to swerve.

Unfortunately, there was a car in front of him

coming the opposite way.

Here's the bee. The culprit of all evil.

I think we can call that "case closed."

We're going to have a chat with Jack

about probably my favourite story ever.

It's about the attack of the killer washing machine.

So this was a 999 call that started with a woman crying

and screaming down the phone, so I switched on straight away,

thinking, "This is going to be really serious."

Managed to calm her down a bit and find out what was going on

and she said, "It's my washing machine, my washing machine."

"OK. What's wrong with your washing machine?"

It turned out that the weights at the top of the washing machine

that stop it moving around had gone,

so she put a load of washing in, turned it on

and it bounced around the kitchen,

so she's run out of the kitchen, actually gone upstairs

and got her kids out of bed,

run out the front door and called the police.

Because she genuinely thinks this washing machine is chasing her?

Scared out of her life. I've never had anyone that scared,

people in real situations, as it were.

What was she thinking? It was a possessed washing machine?

I have no idea, but I had to spend

probably a good 15-20 minutes trying to calm her down. She was outside.

I was talking her through, "We're going to go upstairs,

"put the kids back to bed, walk downstairs."

"I don't want to walk downstairs."

"We'll walk downstairs, go into the kitchen,

"turn the washing machine off by the wall."

Just switch it off by the wall, that'll stop it.

In theory it's a really good idea, but getting her to do that

in that sort of panic was quite a state.

I have to say, I did actually once have a washing machine break

and when the weights go off and they start banging around,

they actually make a terrifying racket.

In the end, you managed to resolve it? Just about, yeah.

We talked her through it, and of course, she was asking me

for plumbers' numbers as well, but obviously, we can't give that out.

So there you go, attack of the killer washing machine. Nice, eh?

Southampton firefighter and animal rescue expert

Anton Phillips has just received a call.

He's on the way to the home of a woman

whose six-week-old pet kitten, Burton,

has just started an impromptu game of hide-and-seek.

He's upside down.

I was upstairs.

Chelsea shouted me, said that the kitten's got caught

down the side of the freezer, so I've come down, and...

Well, all I could hear was him crying

and at that point we couldn't see anything.

We could just hear that he was down the side of the freezer.

'So I was trying to pull the freezer as far over to the side as I could'

to see if I could just, you know, give him enough space

that he could get out, but, obviously, he couldn't

and as I moved it slightly, he yelped a bit.

so I thought, "God, no, that's not the way."

Then we just phoned the fire brigade.

The gap between the wall and the fridge freezer was about an inch.

So really tiny gap, really tiny kitten

and the kitten had gone down and had turned on its back, initially.

So, when I shone the torch down to it, I could see its eyes.

I could see the underside of its paws.

I stood there thinking, "How are we going to get this out

"without doing significant damage to the kitchen

"and, more to the point, without actually damaging the kitten?"

It's not just Anton who's worried about Burton.

The mother is also responding to the anguished cries of her offspring.

CAT MEOWS

I removed most of the stuff off the worktop

and then started to ease the fridge forward from the top

and the kitten then fell into the back of the fridge,

around the compressor.

CAT MEOWS

I then slid the fridge freezer forward and away from the kitten.

Kerrie's daughter Chelsea makes a grab for Burton

and finally the curious cat is free.

Obviously, it was covered in a bit of fluff.

Ordinary fluff that you find behind furniture,

but apart from that, it was in really quite good nick.

And it was then returned to the mother

because it was a very young kitten, only just had its eyes open.

Yeah, he's all good, I think. A bit shaky, but otherwise good, yeah.

Burton may have won his game of hide-and-seek,

but Kerrie's not going to risk losing him again.

I was thinking about leaving the freezer in the middle of the room.

Might be a safer option!

A sweltering July night in London, and the river is packed

with party boats full of people enjoying the long summer's evening.

THEY CHEER

The crew of the Tower lifeboat are on patrol when they get a call

to help a young woman who's been injured

on board one of the pleasure cruises.

The RIB travels along the Thames at full speed,

so radar is vital to show up any hazards in the dark water.

When they arrive, the party is still in full swing.

Volunteer crewmen Colin McCarthy

and Luke Dillon head off in search of the injured woman,

while helmsman Kevin Maynard mans the lifeboat.

Having changed out of her high heels,

the partygoer has cut her foot on broken glass.

There's a lot of blood

and a small piece has become embedded in her heel.

It's clear she's going to need an X-ray.

RNLI crew carry a fully-equipped first aid bag

and with fresh supplies, an off-duty doctor is able to sterilise the cut

before applying a trauma dressing for the trip to A&E.

SHE YELPS IN PAIN

Yeah, it's going to sting, it's going to sting.

You're probably going to need to go to hospital for them

to have a look at it and maybe give it some stitches.

But the question is how to get her to St Thomas' Hospital,

which is a good 45 minutes' walk on two good feet.

The coastguard, along with helmsman Kevin Maynard,

have told the crew not to call

the already overstretched ambulance service.

I'll be totally honest with you, there's no way

you're going to get an ambulance tonight, because they are so busy.

So the best thing for you to do is

we'll give you a hand up onto the pier

and then we'll find a cab

and you can get a cab to St Thomas',

so it's way better to jump into a cab.

Thank you. Thank you. Right, shoes.

Now the woman's foot is dressed and bandaged,

the crewmen get ready to help her to the taxi rank.

Right, are we ready to rock?

We'll just give you a help up to the top, yeah?

If you just sort of hang off the side of us and hobble your way up.

There we go.

OK, are you going to be all right?

You're going to have to do some hopping.

But it soon becomes clear that progress is going to be very slow.

The strong arms of crewmen are needed.

First to step up is Colin.

The Tower station's remit covers emergencies on the river

and the riverbank.

This is proving one of the most demanding for Colin,

in full kit and temperatures reaching 30 degrees.

After a short breather,

it's off again in search of a taxi to hospital.

Finally, they reach the end of the pier.

If you phone for a cab, get them to come down and pick you up here.

Tower of London. Tower of London. Petty Wales.

But there's still a problem.

It's a busy Saturday night

and it seems taxis are almost as busy as ambulances tonight.

However, persistence pays off.

The lengths we go to!

Thank you so much. Here we go.

Thank you. You're really, really kind.

St Thomas', please.

Take it easy. Mind that glass. Well done, girls.

Argue with people to get a cab.

So the young woman bids farewell to her rescuers

and is finally off to hospital for an X-ray on her heel.

It's been a tiring job for the lifeboat crew, but they're soon

back out on the water and heading towards HQ for a well-deserved rest.

Earlier in the programme we saw the RNLI rescuing

the crew of a stricken boat on the Thames.

They arrived just in time to save Imogen, Bee, Tim and Will

seconds before their vintage speedboat sunk.

The group of friends had been on a trip from their barge in Battersea

to Tower Bridge when they hit a wave and the engine broke off.

Looking back, they're just relieved they're still here to tell the tale.

I don't think we had an idea of the danger we really were in.

Yeah, I think that was just ignorance.

I think it was just a bit solemn, really.

It sort of sunk in that we lost our possession, nearly lost our lives.

I'm not surprised. You were so calm.

Being responsible for people almost losing their lives as well.

I think, as a boat owner, it seems fun when you're on it,

but also, you are holding the responsibility

of friends, family, loved ones.

Anything that could happen could have a knock-on effect.

I was elated at first that we'd been rescued,

but afterwards, once it had hit home, I was kind of in shock,

cos I could have lost my friends, lost my girlfriend.

It doesn't bear thinking about, really.

Bee recalls considering swimming back to the bank,

not realising the strength of the currents that could drag her

into the path of the shipping lanes.

My instinct, which was a terrible instinct,

was the thought that I could jump off the boat and swim to the side

and I remember telling Imogen that, you know,

"Why don't I jump off and I take the rope

"and at least I can nudge us in quicker."

And, thank God, she said, "Don't."

I was like, "Just don't risk it.

"It's not worth it cos we just don't know how strong the current is."

So we just stayed on the boat

and just tried to keep it balanced, basically,

and just paddled with our arms

to get to the side.

The four are experienced sailors, but they made a rookie error.

The reason we didn't have lifejackets on

was because it was a bit of a foolish mistake

and we were in a rush.

We didn't get them out the engine room on the barge.

A bit eager to go. Jumped down on the boat and left, really.

The young British tennis player whose car was involved

in a three-car collision on an A road in Buckinghamshire

was taken to Stoke Mandeville Hospital.

She was complaining of leg pain

and cuts to her head after being removed from her smashed-up car.

The first family member to arrive at the scene was her grandfather, Vic.

It couldn't have happened at a worse time.

Claudia was just days away

from starting a prestigious tennis scholarship in the USA.

At hospital, Claudia had X-rays to her chest, head, back and legs,

but her worst injury was to an ear.

A shard of glass from the windscreen had left a very deep cut.

They said there's no broken bones, no serious damage or anything like that.

She had got a cut to her ear

and they were waiting for the plastic surgeon

to come and have a look at that.

Well, the relief from everybody, and just couldn't believe it.

Very thankful, obviously.

The plastic surgeon came up and said, "Yes, it does want doing,"

and they put her in on the Thursday afternoon to do it

and we flew out on the Friday morning to Alabama.

So everything was a bit of a chase that last three days.

There were no charges brought

and Claudia is now in Alabama, starting her training.

The bruises made her limp for a week

but by the time we got to America

and settled in and saw the tennis coach out there

and she'd e-mailed him to put him in the picture,

they checked her out and were going to give her loads of physio

and he was going to look after her for the first week

before they really started training.

They couldn't have been more helpful. Brilliant.

Lucky enough, at the end of the day nobody was seriously injured,

including the other drivers.

You can't ask for no more than that.

And diabetic patient Harry Cowan spent several hours in A&E.

If his blood sugar levels had dropped any further,

he was told he could have been in serious danger.

His blood sugar levels were soon stabilised

and Harry is back home now,

where he and his wife are monitoring his diabetes very closely.

Well, that's just about all we have time for.

Once again, we've seen how our emergency services

are looking after us at every turn

and chivalry is alive and well, as we saw earlier with the RNLI.

That's it. We'll see you next time. Bye-bye.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd