Five police officers among those taken for treatment after being called to Indian eatery in Riverstone
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One person has died and seven people – including five police officers – are being treated in hospital after a gas leak at a restaurant in Sydney’s north-west.
New South Wales ambulance said the people who had been taken to hospital were all in a stable condition.
Continue reading...Devices will vibrate and make a siren sound for 10 seconds at 3pm, with message confirming alert is a test
Millions of mobile phones will vibrate and make a siren sound across the UK on Sunday afternoon during a test of a nationwide emergency alert system.
Handset users will also receive a message on their screens reminding them the 10-second alert, which will happen at 3pm, is a test. There are about 87m mobile phones in the UK.
Continue reading...High numbers of staff leaving because of high pressure, lack of support, verbal abuse, long shifts and low pay, union says
NHS call handlers are quitting amid burnout at dealing with 999 calls about suicides, stabbings and shootings and the long delays before ambulances reach patients.
The pressure is so intense that 27% of control room staff in ambulance services across Britain have left their jobs over the last three years, NHS figures show.
Continue reading...Move is part of £450m Wes Streeting plan to tackle long delays and end hospital overcrowding
Hundreds of thousands of patients needing urgent medical help will be treated in settings other than A&E as part of a drive to cut “corridor care” and avoid another NHS winter crisis.
The move is a central plank of a government plan to improve urgent and emergency care in England, tackle the long delays many patients face in A&E and banish overcrowding in hospitals.
Continue reading...Two days of heavy rainfall still on way as SES carries out 130 rescues amid floods in Taree and nearby areas
Residents of the mid-north coast of New South Wales have described anxious waits for rescue in the dark as unprecedented flooding inundates homes and businesses across the region.
The State Emergency Service has performed 130 rescues in the past 24 hours, the bulk of those occurring in Taree, Wingham and Glenthorne.
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Continue reading...Two personnel in serious condition after accident near city lashed by torrential rain brought by ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred
Twelve soldiers remain in hospital – two in a serious condition – after two army trucks carrying troops rolled on a country road near Lismore on Saturday evening as ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred lashed the northern New South Wales coast and southern Queensland.
Thirty-two defence personnel were involved in the crash – members of the 2nd Combat Engineer Regiment, part of the 7th Brigade based at Gallipoli Barracks in northern Brisbane – just after 5pm on Tregeagle Road, 9km south-west of Lismore.
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Continue reading...Free training classes for firefighters and other first responders are provided through Fema at the Maryland site
The country’s pre-eminent federal fire training academy canceled classes, effective immediately, on Saturday amid the ongoing flurry of funding freezes and staffing cuts by Donald Trump’s administration.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced that National Fire Academy (NFA) courses had been canceled amid a “process of evaluating agency programs and spending to ensure alignment with Administration priorities”, according to a notice sent to instructors, students and fire departments. Instructors were told to cancel all future travel until further notice.
Continue reading...BoM path track map predicts TC Alfred will cross coast on Saturday near Brisbane, the first storm of its size to do so in decades. Follow the latest updates today
Welfare recipients told to perform mutual obligations as cyclone bears down
We have a news story this morning about the impact the cyclone is already having on life in Queensland.
Fallen trees and giant stands of bamboo blocked the single road to our farm until the army and council brought heavy machinery to clear a path some time after.
We were without running water or power for days, maybe weeks, the packing shed a makeshift kitchen where we ate meals cooked off a gas barbecue and drank instant coffee made with rainwater and UHT milk to the hum of a generator.
Continue reading...BoM path track map predicts TC Alfred will cross coast on Friday near Brisbane, the first storm of its size to do so in decades. Follow the latest updates today
Speaking of preparations, adjunct senior lecturer at the Centre for Disaster Studies at James Cook University Yetta Gurtner gives advice here:
Chalmers confident insurance companies ‘know their responsibilities’
I’m confident they know their responsibilities and obligations to people.
Continue reading...Public concern about NHS is worrying and frightening, says leading emergency doctor after poll revealed
Three in four people in the UK fear getting stuck on a trolley in a hospital corridor or an ambulance not arriving after dialling 999, prompting claims that the NHS is facing “a crisis of public trust”.
Huge numbers also worry about their local A&E not having enough beds (77%) and not being able to get care at their GP surgery (70%), research also found.
Continue reading...Exclusive: paramedics unable to respond to 100,000 calls a month as they wait to hand over patients
Paramedics in England are unable to respond to 100,000 urgent 999 calls every month because they are stuck outside hospitals waiting to hand over patients, endangering thousands of lives, the Guardian can reveal.
As the crisis engulfing the NHS intensified this weekend, figures showed ambulance crews are tied up at A&E for so long that on more than 3,500 occasions each day they are unable to respond to a 999 plea for help.
Continue reading...Federal government to fund 80% of upgrades with state paying for 20%, despite previously vowing to split infrastructure projects 50-50
In the first major promise of the election year, Anthony Albanese has announced $7.2bn in funding for Queensland’s Bruce Highway.
The federal government will fund 80% of the upgrades, with the state funding 20%.
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Continue reading...Patients waiting many hours for ambulances to arrive, while those phoning 999 struggle to get through
A “critical incident” was declared by the Welsh ambulance service on Monday evening due to significantly increased demand and extensive handover delays.
The ambulance service, which covers 3 million-plus people across Wales, said more than 340 calls were waiting to be answered at the time the critical incident was declared.
Continue reading...Emergency crews were unable to save Kate Mulcahy while her children escaped from a fire at her home in Manchester
Tributes have been paid to a 37-year-old woman who died in a house fire in Greater Manchester where her four children survived.
Kate Mulcahy was found dead inside her home in Middleton after a fire broke out early on Sunday morning. It is understood she had two sons – one-year-old twins – and two daughters, and that a number of the children were in the house and managed to escape the blaze.
Continue reading...Number of people affected unclear after disruption made it impossible to reach emergency services through number
The 911 system across Massachusetts was restored Tuesday after going down for several hours, which made it impossible for anyone to reach emergency services through the call number.
The Massachusetts state police announced around 3.45pm that the system had been restored and that people could resume calling emergency services. They didn’t provide any details about the cause of the outage.
Continue reading...Andreas Pantziaros given prohibition order from NSW Health Care Complaints Commission after purporting to be a paramedic
A man who wore a uniform, drove a vehicle closely resembling an ambulance and charged for emergency health services he was not qualified to perform has been deemed a risk to public health and safety.
The NSW Health Care Complaints Commission has handed down a permanent prohibition order against Andreas Pantziaros for offering health services via his company Medic Corp Ambulance.
Continue reading...More than 100 homes damaged when tornado ripped off roofs, collapsed walls and sucked up debris in state’s south-west
Asbestos scattered over residential streets has prompted a “hazmat emergency” response in Western Australia’s south-west, with specialist crews urgently working to contain any possible exposure aftter a devastating tornado.
More than 100 homes were damaged when the tornado ripped off roofs, collapsed walls and sucked up debris into the sky at Bunbury on Friday afternoon.
Continue reading...SES issues minor flood warnings for the Hawkesbury River at North Richmond and the Colo River
Sydney’s Warragamba dam began spilling over for the second time in a month on Sunday after heavy downpours across New South Wales.
WaterNSW has confirmed the dam began spilling at 7.30am after widespread rain across the city’s catchments.
Continue reading...Emergency services corden off large area of Darwen while army bomb disposal unit removes and destroys grenade
A town centre in Lancashire was placed in lockdown on Saturday, with British army bomb disposal experts forced to remove and destroy a grenade.
It is understood that a member of the public had donated items to a heritage centre in Darwen which included the grenade.
Continue reading...Vapour created by a stall-holder ‘cooking a large amount of chillies’ entered ventilation system
A market in Chester was evacuated on Saturday because of fumes caused by a stall-holder “cooking a large amount of chillies”.
Chester fire and rescue service said vapour from the cooking of a large quantity of chilli oil had entered the market’s ventilation system.
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