Emergency Services to collaborate over Bonfire Weekend

Emergency Services in Lancashire are responding to incidents together in a bid to reduce demand on the three services which tends to increase during high profile nights such as bonfire night.

Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service (LFRS), Lancashire Constabulary and North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) are working together to provide a joint response in areas of Lancashire where they can assist collaboratively with incidents such as fires with casualties, road traffic collisions, assaults and medical emergencies where forced entry to a property is required.

A multi-agency vehicle will be used which will be crewed by trained Operational Commanders from Fire and Police, they will respond to incidents where the team can carry out a multi-agency scene assessment, determine the level of resources required, ensuring scene and responder safety and provide specialist support. The team is expected to deploy to any relevant incident where at least a dual service response is required.

Tom Cookson, Group Manager and Head of Emergency Planning at Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service said: “During high profile events such as bonfire night, the demand on emergency services tends to increase. Locally based responders working together can provide lifesaving interventions at emergencies, and in some instances reduce the number of resources needed at a scene, allowing resources to attend the incidents they are most needed.”

This multi-agency vehicle has been used previously and was found to be successful, with the initial trial taking pace in 2017. The collaboration meant that crews managed unnecessary incident attendance and improved time scales of crews that would usually be detained at a scene, supported on-scene commanders, offer specialised support, and provided lifesaving interventions and assessment. In 2022, LFRS responded to 158 incidents on bonfire night, and 59 of those incidents were dealt with by the multi-agency vehicles, freeing up vital resources to respond to other incidents.