There
was both good and bad news to start the 50’s, another emergency
station, Mitcham, was transferred to Fire Service control in January
1950, this made two stations they now had under their command. Better
news in March though, the introduction, of what many considered
to be the finest ambulance ever to be built, and was to be the backbone
of the service, for a good many years.
On March 10th 1950 THE ESHER NEWS reported :
ESHER'S
NEW AMBULANCE
MODERN VEHICLE COST
NEARLY £2,000
 Click
"Resembling a small modern bus, both in design
and size, a new ambulance - described as the most powerful Surrey
County Council has ever had - is now in service at Esher Ambulance
sub-station. Esher thus becomes the first sub-station in Surrey
to be equipped with one. With the world's longest car-type chassis,
(l2ft. 6in.), and specially designed by Daimler to conform with
certain specifications of the Ministry of Health, this new model
represents a great stride forward in raising the standard
of hospital equipment to meet modern-day requirements. As
is evident by the all-round improvement over the vehicles at present
in general service. The cost is in the region of £1,900,
and its estimated life is put at fifteen years, which is the equivalent
of half a life extra on present types. Major advantages
are the spaciousness and ample headroom made available by the increased
size, extra lighting, air conditioning, heating, independent suspension
on the front wheels, which iron out bumps in the road, and as far
as possible all noise. Facilities for patients has been greatly
improved, and the layout, which includes an escape hatch, offers
four or five methods of getting patients in and out. Permanent
beds, with four inch thick rubber mattresses, are fitted with adjustable
cot sides, which help to ensure the safety of the patient while
travelling. These beds which have adjustable ends for use
in place of pillows, may be folded back for cleaning purposes, and
there is no corner that cannot be easily reached."
So having chosen and got the finances for the
type of vehicle they wanted, it was now time to look for other
ways to improve and take the service forward.
May
1951 at last saw the consolidation of the young service, with the
Minister of Health's decision to drop the scheme that allowed the
Fire Service to run a separate emergency ambulance service.
The service could now once again look to the future
with confidence.
But as the Chief outlined in : Standing
Order 221
"The way ahead is still difficult however.
There can be no magic transfers to new and suitable premises, communications
will remain difficult for some time, and peace time training must
take its place with Civil Defence requirements. The
need for a service which is efficient and looks efficient is more
important then ever".
A training school, was to be
the next step. As well as having to hold a clean driving license,
ambulance men were expected to hold a current first aid certificate,
to be renewed every three years, but it was felt this only
covered a fraction of the type of knowledge and skill required by
the service. The first training school was set up at Roselands
New Malden in 1954. The aim of the school was to give the
staff a good all round knowledge of their requirements, this included
care of patients i.e.:- handling general admissions, mental
health patients, emergency childbirth and major emergencies. Making
sure their first aid was up to scratch, maintenance
of vehicles, and at that time a lot of Civil Defence came into the
syllabus.
Mr "Wally" Carver was appointed
to run the school as a full time instructor. Wally Carver
must have been one of the most popular and respected characters
in the the service, not just because nearly all "passed"
through his training school, but for his quiet ways, and droll
sense of humour, nothing ever seemed to ruffle Wally. One major
problem with the training school, it was not within it’s power to
issue first aid certificates as only The St John Ambulance
Brigade, and the British Red Cross Society were authorised to do
so. This caused a certain amount of resentment amongst
the staff, as it was felt as a professional service they should
not have to get their first aid training from a voluntary organisation.
The 1950's were to see a lot of changes in
regards to the resiting and renewing of many stations, and
the updating and modernising of communications, and one was very
much linked with the other.
Control stations were
set up in each area,
Kingston and St Hellier in
A and B areas,
Redhill, Woking and Guildford, for
C, D and E areas. Redhill Control was one of the first to
move, when in 1951 they were relocated at Smallfieds near
Horley, Kingston Control moved to New Malden at the
end of 1953, and Woking Control was relocated into a new station
at Chertsey.
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St Hellier
opened a new control station towards the end of 1955. Guildford
already had adequate room so they were able to stay
put. In those early days a lot of the calls for ambulances
came via the Fire Service, and most stations accepted their own
calls , this meant that if all ambulances were called out at any
particular station no one could contact them until they returned.
To overcome this situation, in the first instance,
control rooms were set up at main stations with clerk/telephonists
to take and distribute calls.
Now, although initially local stations were still
accepting calls, at last there was a line of communication
contactable 24 hours a day. Gradually private lines were
introduced to each sub-station, linked to the appropriate
control station, and the need for individual stations to accept
their own calls ended. (There was one exception to this arrangement,
Farnham Sub were to accept their own calls until they gave
up their agency in the 1960's). Radio link with vehicles was agreed
by Surrey County Council in 1951, but it was not
until the following year that the first vehicles were equipped
with them.
As the metropolitan area of the county was
the busiest, A and B divisions were the first to have
radios fitted to their vehicles, this was followed over the
next few years to include the whole county
Staff manning
control rooms also changed, telephonists were phased out,
and driver/controllers took their place. According to the
press the final link was put into place in 1956, when the
last of the radio transmitters came on line, giving complete cover
for the whole of the county. These transmitters were sited at Banstead,
Reigate Hill, and the Hogs Back Guildford.
There was to be two more changes to control before
the end of the decade. Firstly an increase of staff to enable two
men to be on duty at all times, under the supervision of a control
officer. Secondly A and B control would merge into one
to cover the metropolitan area of Surrey, and was simply called
Met Control.
What of the men in this new service, the
nucleus were already ambulance men, a few from pre-war times, but
most of the new staff were over 25 years old, with a clean driving
license, mainly ex-servicemen, and therefore used to discipline. Once
out on the road they were expected to make their own decisions,
and this could often be a life or death one. They could go
from working on their own, to crewing with a partner, and in the
case of major incidents would have to mould quickly into a
team.
Every aspect of ambulance work was expected of them,
from taking admissions and out patients to hospital, dealing
with the mentally ill, maternity and premature babies,
to all types of emergency calls. The cleanliness and upkeep
of their vehicles as well as their stations was also part of their
duties. Flexibility is probably the best word
to describe ambulance personnel, (this applies even to-day). Their
work pattern changed from day to day, new equipment and methods
were frequently introduced, and they would be expected to respond
to urgent and emergency calls right up until their finishing time.
The demise of the voluntary stations began
to take place at this time, no one doubted the valuable work and
dedication these people had contributed in the past. Many reasons
were given at the time for the removal of the ambulances
from these stations, from under funding to intimidation, but
reading the press reports from the time one thing was common
to all the stations affected, there was just not enough volunteers.
As the service grew so did its responsibility, besides
providing transport for the growing Health Service, its role in
Civil Defence increased, as did cover required for the increase
in road traffic and the rapidly expanding major airports
at London and Gatwick on its borders, for which
they would be expected to provide back up in the event
of a major emergency.
A test for any Ambulant Service,
is how quick they can mobilise their individual crews into
a team, able to cope with major incidents. Unfortunately major
incidents were all too soon to become a reality, one
of the first tests was in 1951, at Reigate. An accident
between a coach and two cars, needed 5 ambulances to take
the 14 patients to hospital. 1952 and a rail crash at Guildford
with 19 patients. But worse was to come, for later that year
an air disaster at The Farnborough Air Show, when Surrey as the
back up service had the unenviable task of removing the dead or
what remained of them, and as one of the now retired Officers put
it "there was no counselling for traumatic shock in those
days".
There were to be two more rail
crashes before the end of that first decade both in December 1955.
The first was at Barnes when over 40 people were
either killed or injured. The second later in the same month
at Woking, fortunately only 14 passengers out of a 1,000 were
injured.
In February 1959 a Turkish Airline carrying the Turkish
Prime Minister crashed at Gatwick Airport killing 12 people. The
prime minister survived.
The service had faced the test
and passed with flying colours, and lessons learned would
not be forgotten, but knowledge gained passed on to others for use
in the future.
So by the end of the 50's, the service could
look back with pride on its achievements, it had come a long way,
from being a hotch potch, part time in places, run partly
by volunteers, to a full time united service, with radio
controlled vehicles, prepared for any event.
 Swinging 60's
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