Episode 18 Helicopter Heroes

If you're critically ill, or seriously injured,

seconds count. And in Britain's biggest county,

you can be a long way from help.

-Where's the patient?

-Stuck under the car!

The Yorkshire Air Ambulance flies at 150 miles an hour,

and thanks to its speed, hundreds of patients are alive today -

saved by a highly skilled team of doctors and paramedics.

-Stand clear everybody.

-Keep going, mate.

It covers some of the UK's most rugged landscapes.

Turning roadsides into operating theatres.

We're going to pop him off to sleep with an emergency anaesthetic, OK?

And town centres into heli pads.

-Still good on the left?

-Just behind you, Tim.

And every day the helimed team's skill,

speed and courage is saving lives.

Today on Helicopter Heroes -

two children are badly injured in a freak accident,

and the team must fly them both.

The trailer fell down the bank and it landed on two of them.

Paramedic Darrell treats a teenager who's a millimetre from death.

We believe he's sat on this spike on the railing.

He's been a very lucky man.

High in the hills, a runner's at the centre of a major rescue operation.

Too many people running along here.

Caring for the grandkids can be one of the pleasures

of middle age for many.

But keeping children amused isn't easy.

And with all that fun comes an awful lot of responsibility.

For cousins Ethan and Louise here,

a ride behind Granddad's tractor mower is an exciting

part of the summer holiday.

But one day this year, the fun ended in a terrible accident.

We'd been called to a detail just outside of Pickering.

Three young lads had been playing on a trailer

had fallen off of it, and one of them sustained quite a

nasty fracture to his leg.

Ethan and Louis are badly hurt.

The trailer in which they were riding turned over

and rolled down the bank on the left in this family video.

Ethan's leg is badly broken.

It's feared Louis has a serious head injury.

There's another cross with a yellow car

-at your three o'clock, now.

-Got it, mate. Yeah.

Pilot Chris Attrill must find somewhere to land

in the remote village of Newton on Rawcliffe.

Approach for that, and land on the section of junction.

Yeah. I've got a feeling there's a set of wires there, mate.

Just where that blue car's pulled up.

It should be easy, but power lines and phone wires are in the way.

There you go, guys.

Paramedics Darren Axe and Sam Burgess

will have to walk to their patients.

They were being towed on the little trailer behind

my husband's lawn tractor and there's a very, very steep bank down there.

And the trailer came off and fell down the bank,

and it landed on...two of them.

It was...just a horrible fright.

Sam and Darren must decide which of the children

most needs a flight to hospital,

a decision based on examinations carried out by local paramedics.

He's had his first morphine, so...

That were only five minutes ago so...

We'll let that rest a bit then.

He's making plenty of noise, sat up, all the rest of it.

This kid's been in the same accident. He's just bumped his head,

but he's been really quite quiet.

He's not complaining of anything, and mum says normally he would.

The team suspects five-year-old Ethan has broken his femur,

the biggest bone in the body.

Four-year-old Louis has banged his head. It's immediately clear

that both the children need to be flown to hospital.

If we can, we will, but it's a matter of space inside the machine.

That's what holds us back.

Like you say... He's had five minutes... Get another bit in.

Morphine is the strongest painkiller available to the paramedics

but children this young can only be given a small dose.

Ethan is still struggling with the pain.

If we give you some more of our really nice medicine,

then that pain will go away and you'll feel better. OK?

We'll just do that first...and then we're going to take you for a ride.

Sam suspects Louis' head injury may be serious.

Do you feel me touching your hand?

Yeah? Do you feel me touching your other hand?

Do you feel me touching your tummy?

We'll get you moved fairly soon, all right?

Darren and Sam decide to take both boys to hospital -

Louis and his mum first.

The helicopter will then return for his cousin.

Me and Chris, now, will fly with him,

and Chris will return to get this lad.

It didn't appear too serious initially,

but he is very quiet and...with him being so quiet after such an injury...

He's quite a boisterous boy, apparently.

Daddy is on his way in the train, cos he wants to come and see you,

cos he's so worried.

Louis' mum Rebecca is trying to reassure her son -

he wants his daddy who's at work.

She's desperately worried but trying to conceal it.

Sam knows children with head injuries

often display relatively few symptoms,

but then deteriorate far faster than adults.

En route to James Cook.

If Louis' condition worsens, Sam will have to cope alone.

The 35-mile-flight to the James Cook Trauma Centre

in Middlesbrough could be stressful for patient, parent and paramedic.

The human body is an amazing thing.

Packed inside each of us is around 20 feet of intestine,

2,500 miles of airway

and a staggering 60,000 miles of blood vessel,

not to mention several vital organs.

So it's not surprising that even a minor injury can do serious damage.

Every day, Yorkshire's ambulances respond to around 2,000 emergencies,

but it's a hot day and the number of 999 calls

has soared with the temperature.

It's left paramedics struggling to cope with demand.

I've just had an update. This is a very serious injury.

It's gone through his abdomen, back out.

Have we got any vehicles en route to it yet, over?

That's a negative. I've looked.

We haven't got anyone to send at the moment, over.

The summer sun means that paramedics John Baxter and Darrell Cullen

may be on their own - with a critically injured patient.

-There's a...

-I could put it there. I could put it in the school.

Your choice. School's got a fence around it, though.

Pilot Andy Lister is forced to drop his crew

almost quarter of a mile from the patient.

Heli 99 is now landing at the scene.

This lad's just going to show us where the...casualty is.

It's just somewhere up here on the right-hand side.

16-year-old David Harrop slipped while climbing over a fence.

One of these spikes entered his groin

and came out on the other side of his body.

Hello there. Hi, mate. How's it going?

He's in the care of a lone fast-response paramedic.

We believe he's sat on this spike on a railing.

It's gone in from his...bottom of his right buttock.

It's come through his abdomen?

Darrell knows that David could be bleeding internally.

The spike penetrated an area near his femoral artery.

If it's punctured, he could bleed to death internally in minutes.

His mates have lifted him off, so I'm assuming he's sat it...

He's in severe pain.

I'm going to be up front with you now - it's probably going to hurt,

-but just take a bit more of that.

-Keep taking that...

David was with his mates when the accident happened.

They lifted him off the fence and carried him home.

He were climbing over a green fence about this big.

He didn't put his hand down and slipped backwards...

And then landed on the spike. OK.

Did you, like, fall?

It was a fall...and then he landed on the...yeah.

Did you take him off, then?

He got himself off. He stood straight back up.

Despite the demand,

a ground ambulance has finally been found to help the helimed team

For Darrell and John it's a welcome sight.

Neither David nor his family and friends

seem to realise how serious his injury is.

We'll give you a bit more morphine and get you settled.

He were climbing over a spike fence, and slipped backwards,

and it's gone straight through his leg.

I tried putting pressure on it - he just wouldn't let me.

We tried lifting him off, but he wouldn't stay still.

He's walked himself up here.

Just make note of that pain and tell me if it gets any better.

In the next few minutes it should start to kick in.

Where the pole has gone through him, which is right under his buttock

and then out through his abdomen,

there's some significant vascular problems that could be caused.

That could go at any time or be mass problems,

so we're going to take him to Northern General,

which is...the nearest hospital with vascular surgery.

Just to be sure there's someone there

who can get in there and sort it out.

Just to re-check his blood pressure and that.

Pinch of blood from your fingertip, all right?

He'll be monitoring David's condition

every second of his flight.

To help him, he's marking the position of the pulse in his foot.

Its disappearance could be the first sign of an internal bleed -

and that could be fatal.

I like to keep fit and, on my days off,

chances are you'll find me in the gym.

But compared with one group of hardcore athletes,

I'm totally out of condition.

Fell running is acknowledged to be one of the UK's

toughest sports.

Fell runners think marathons are for wimps,

and even the thought of the race they call the Fellsman

reduces serious joggers like me to tears.

Imagine running 60 miles over a route

that climbs a total of 11,000 feet up some of England's biggest peaks.

Not surprisingly, one entrant needs these guys.

They've got someone up on Whernside on a stretcher that's fallen.

From there, there's no vehicle access, so they've requested us.

The team's heading to the Three Peaks area

in the Yorkshire Dales.

This rugged landscape

is a racetrack for some of the UK's top fell runners.

The casualty's near the top of Whernside, a 2,000ft peak.

The wind means it would be too dangerous for pilot Chris

to shut down Helimed 99's engines,

so paramedic Paul's off to find their patient.

99, we're actually on the ground.

Paul's just heading over to them now, mate.

All right, Glen. So you've been running up here, have you, pal?

I was running down at the time.

I just seem to have sprained my ankle, I think.

Right. OK.

Fell running is an extreme sport.

It's not about speed but sheer endurance.

And Glynn Daniels has made the mistake

of running downhill too quickly.

It looks like his ankle is broken.

Have you put that bandage on yourself?

-No.

-One of the other competitors just put it on.

Right. So nothing's come through at all?

-No.

-As far as you're aware.

-No.

She said she'd sooner rather do that,

-that take the shoe off and having the swelling come up.

-Right.

Glynn's one of 400 competitors running the Fellsman.

Can you move the foot at all? Can you rotate it a little bit?

-Yeah.

-You can.

So it's looking a bit more like a sprain rather than a break.

Paul knows how his patient feels,

he's actually taken part in this race.

Pilot Chris wants to land Helimed 99 on the track

so rescuers do not need to lift their patient

over a six-foot dry-stone wall.

We'll just work out the best way to get you down, Glen.

That's the top and bottom of it, pal.

You're on a bit of a funny little part of this path,

as you can see.

There's too many people running along there.

They'd have to stop the race.

But fellow runners are reluctant to stop.

Chris can't find a gap in the field to touch down.

All right, mate. I'm just going to leave it for the moment.

We'll go away.

I'll just go back to where I was, mate.

You, unfortunately, are going to have to get him over,

cos people are going to try and come underneath if we try and land.

Right, Glen. The pilot doesn't want to shut that down.

If he shuts it down then he's in a lot of trouble.

So we're going to do what you call a hot load,

and its where these rotors running.

You'll be complete safe,

all you need to do is listen to what we say, pal.

Got the most important person here. All right, pal.

What I'm going to do, I'm going to get him to the wall.

Once we get him to the wall, we're going to seat him on the wall.

Keep that back to the wall and don't walk towards the aircraft.

We'll do the walking.

We'll put his arm around us and we'll hop him on his good leg.

Push down that good leg. Don't rest on that right.

Right. If you go round someone's shoulder. Go round here.

And we're just going to have a hop, slowly away to that wall.

Let us know when you need a rest,

-cos you've got one leg and we've got two.

-Oh, no. I'm good.

So Glynn has to be lifted over the wall.

The weather's taken a turn for the worse and there's no time to waste.

The windchill is beginning to bite.

Watch your hands on that stone there, pal.

Anywhere else, Glynn's injury would be minor -

it certainly wouldn't require an air ambulance.

So their patient's being flown down to the valley below.

A ground ambulance is waiting beneath the Ribblehead railway viaduct

to take him on the next leg of his journey to hospital.

At last, pilot Chris can shut down Helimed 99's engines.

It's been a difficult flight for such a minor injury.

There was a lot of contestants, shall we say, or competitors is

probably a better word.

Barking also comes to mind, running around there.

A lot of people running down the track,

so they probably wanted to continue on with their race,

and they would probably get in our way.

And, obviously, to stay out of their way,

we landed back on the other side of the wall

and had to put the casualty across the wall.

It turns out Glynn's a very serious runner.

Well, I did Coventry 40 miler last week - that went OK.

I did the Belvoir Challenge the month before,

which is an off-road marathon. Again, OK.

Left foot down first. Just sit your bum down first.

Just get a rest.

Paul Kilner can only admire his stamina.

I did once try this, unfortunately I never completed it.

I stopped at about 28 miles.

It was a lot hotter than today.

It throws many challenges up, for anyone who's ever competed in this.

But, yeah, whether I'll ever do it again, I don't know.

Glynn's driven off to hospital,

leaving his fellow runners to complete their race.

What he doesn't know is that the weather is about to deteriorate.

And tonight, for the first time in its history, the race is called off,

after several entrants are overtaken by hypothermia.

Back in North Yorkshire,

the operation to rescue two children injured in a freak accident

is reaching a critical stage - and the team's concerned.

Five-year-old Ethan's leg is badly broken after an accident involving

a trailer towed by his granddad's tractor mower.

Paramedic Darren needs to straighten it.

Ethan, we're just going to wait another minute

until that medicine works, and then we're going to straighten your leg

out a little bit and make it better.

Ethan's in pain but his grandparents are

suffering their own trauma.

My... My husband's in a terrible state.

He was towing their trailer behind his lawn tractor

and he's in a dreadful state.

We don't really know how they are or...or anything.

SCREAMING

But, as you can hear, the little boy Ethan, he's in terrible pain,

and he can't move his leg.

It's just been an awful shock.

Ethan's cousin Louis is already airborne,

on his way to hospital in Middlesbrough.

The boys were visiting their grandparents' home

in the remote village of Newton on Rawcliffe.

Local paramedics called in the helimed team.

With only one crew being immediately available in the vicinity,

helimed would be quicker, and that's proved to be the case, really.

In fact, they're going to return for the second child, cos it will still

be quicker doing than taking him by land ambulance to hospital.

-All still good, mate?

-Yeah. We're all good in the back, mate.

Poor little lad is having the usual dilemma

that children have on helicopters -

they want to sleep cos it's a really smooth ride,

but he's really excited about being on a helicopter

so he wants to stay awake as well.

Boys will be boys.

Back at the scene of the accident,

paramedic Darren knows he must straighten his young patient's leg.

The problem is, Ethan's still in a lot of pain

and he can't give him any more morphine.

-OK, Ethan...

-Just squeeze my hand...

I'm going to take the knee.

Ethan really doesn't want his leg straightening

and decides to fight back.

Thanks for that(!)

Paramedic Daz is caught by a swift blow from the five-year-old.

Please don't take me...!

-I'm bleeding now.

-Look what you've done to the man.

You've busted my nose. That was a good shot, wasn't it?

Eventually, Daz does manage to straighten the damaged limb

and the team remove him from the trailer,

but persuading Ethan to lie down will require further patience.

I want you to take some more this magic wind.

You listen to it and it makes a noise, like a dragon.

Did you hear that? And when you hold it in your mouth and suck

the pain goes away.

Remember we used it earlier..?

You take some nice, deep breaths from me, as though were trying to suck

the cream out of a...bun.

Eventually, Darren's persuasion works

and Ethan's almost ready for his flight.

-There you go.

-You've done it!

I told you it would be all right once we got there.

That's better.

He didn't like my bedside manner...too much,

and gave me a bit of a left hook, and took a chunk out of my nose

with a really long fingernail.

So...nobody can say that I've not bled for this.

And...he's a little bit more settled now.

But that's the first time anybody's caught me in 20 years.

Despite his patient's left hook,

Darren hasn't lost his sense of humour -

the village pub looks tempting.

Can't pop over and get two pints of lager, can you?

-Lager?

-And a double rum.

A double rum for him and a pint of lager for me.

This is 98. Lifted from James Cook and running back for the second run.

As Helimed 98 heads south, paramedic Darren can only await its arrival.

It's always difficult dealing with kids.

They don't react the same way as adults.

We sort of gave as much pain relief as we could to this

young man that we've got here. He has settled eventually

but it took a lot of patience and a lot of discussion.

I always find it's best not to lie to them.

Tell them the truth, tell them that it's going to hurt,

and eventually they'll come round to your way of thinking

and you can get them to do what they want.

Ethan and his mum

will be airborne in minutes for Middlesbrough, where they

and the boys' shocked grandparents

will find out how serious their injuries are.

Air ambulances save lives by saving time.

The helimed team cover 6,000 square miles, but nowhere's so remote

that hospital is more than 10 minutes away.

And, in some cases,

that can make the difference between life and death.

David Harrop's life is in the balance

but this flight could save him.

Hi there, it's Darrell from air ambulance.

We're bringing in a 16-year-old lad, a David Harrop.

Half an hour ago,

a spike from this fence tore through the muscles and blood vessels

at the top of his right leg.

20 miles from his home in Doncaster,

surgeons are already preparing to operate

on their 16-year-old patient.

His pulse rate's 74, and it's saturating at 100 on oxygen.

The only pain he has is actually at the site of the injury.

Peripheral pulses are present. His foot pulses are present.

Helimed 98 alpha. We are now lifting from scene.

Shall be landing in about three minutes.

Paramedic Darrell Cullen knows the short flight

to Sheffield Northern General Hospital will take less than 10 minutes,

but for him it will feel much longer.

His BP and all his observations are absolutely fine.

At this time, we're happy with his condition.

The bizarre accident has left David

with what amounts to a very serious stab wound.

In the next few minutes,

doctors at the Northern General will find out the extent of his injury.

He seems to be moving everything,

so hopefully it's gone through and missed everything.

If it's hit an artery, it can cause serious problems.

It...it could fracture the pelvis perhaps, when it goes through there.

It could be all sorts of problems

that happens with injuries in that area.

That night, they operate on the wound

and carry out extensive repairs to muscles, nerves and blood vessels.

Phenomenally lucky, really, because the spike has passed very close

to major blood vessels,

which do carry all the blood to the lower limbs,

so the amount of blood

passing through those blood vessels would have led to

catastrophic haemorrhage, had they been injured.

So it's a remarkable escape.

I can't believe he just walked home.

Neither can I. He should have just stayed where he were.

Back home in Doncaster,

his shocked friends can only reflect on a freak accident

that could easily have cost David his life.

I've had to stand under a bit of fence

and get David onto my shoulders, with Jordan helping me.

So...and then I had to walk him round and that's when we realised how

bad it were. So... Jordan rang him mum and I rang t'ambulance people.

It's a good job helicopter come, otherwise he might not be here now.

A week later, their mate's back home -

still showing the scars of a very narrow escape.

Said it were a millimetre away from...

If I went a millimetre to the left I would have died, basically, so...

That's all I've been thinking about - if it did actually go to the left

I wouldn't be here now, telling you this.

Yeah. I won't be doing it again.

We would expect, when seeing somebody like this,

that they would have some kind of major injury, internally.

So...he's been a very lucky man.

Back to Helimed 98 now,

and the paramedics have a difficult case on their hands.

In the village of Newton on Rawcliffe,

in the North York Moors National Park,

two boys have been injured

after they rolled down an embankment in this trailer.

Kids were just having a little ride on the tractor and trailer,

a little lawn mower, and they've fallen off.

Four-year-old Louis has already been flown to James Cook Hospital

and five-year-old Ethan is now ready to make the same short flight.

Aw, light as a feather.

His mother Jackie will be travelling with him to hospital.

Mummy...

-Hang on a minute.

-You can, in a second.

Ethan's still in pain, and this flight

will save him the discomfort of a half-hour

road journey to hospital.

His grandparents' home is in the heart of the North York Moors,

with its tourist traffic and narrow roads,

but nothing will delay Helimed 98.

Doctors are waiting to examine the second young member of the family.

They find that his leg is badly fractured.

They need to wait for the swelling to subside

before making a decision on how to mend the break.

They just tilted the bed up, his leg up in the air,

and he was in absolute agony all that night.

They decided, the next day, they wouldn't plaster it,

he would have a pin.

Mum, can I have something?

You can, darling. We'll have your tea in a minute, shall we?

As soon as he had his operation, he seems to be a lot better.

Within 24 hours, Ethan's sitting up and taking notice,

but his thirst for adventure is temporarily dimmed.

He did say, "I'm not going to play out ever again."

But I think he will, cos he's not an indoor person.

He doesn't like it...he likes to get his wellies on and be out,

don't you? You'll play outside again, won't you?

Just not near Granddad's tractor and trailer.

And a few days later, Ethan is reunited with his cousin

and playmate Louis back at their grandparents' home.

His head injury turned out to be minor,

but Ethan won't be climbing trees again until his leg heals.

Would you like to come down?

For Louis's mum,

seeing her four-year-old playing happily again is a big relief.

The ambulance man said,

"The ones that are making a lot of noise are all right,

"it's the ones that are really quiet that we're more worried about."

And I kind of thought, "Oh, no!"

It's a day that the boys' grandparents

are unlikely to forget in a hurry - especially their granddad.

Poor John - he a couple of days of absolute hell,

because he felt so responsible.

He felt like he could have killed his grandchildren.

How would you feel?

You feel so useless when there's a child in agony.

It's the most horrible situation.

The ambulance men, after the kids had gone in the helicopter,

they were brilliant with my dad.

And checked him out, because he was in such a state of shock,

and so devastated by it all.

And I'm pleased to say,

both those young patients have now fully recovered

much to the relief of their parents and grandparents.

Subtitles By Red Bee Media Ltd