Firefighters rescue ill man from first floor window of Hampstead flat
The scene in Hampstead High Street yesterday morning Picture: Tim Goss - Credit: Archant
An unwell man was taken from the window of a first floor Hampstead flat by a fire brigade cherry picker yesterday morning.
Traffic blocked off in Hampstead High Street Picture; Tim Goss - Credit: Archant
Hampstead High Street was closed from about 10am to 11am while emergency services – including ambulances and fire engines – worked to get the man to hospital.
A witness said the combination of the man’s condition and the building’s layout meant they could not bring him down the stairs.
Tim Goss said there were “major traffic problems” while the fire brigade tried to gain access to the building.
An electric cable blocked them, he said, so firefighters had to cut through it – all while the patient remained strapped to a stretcher.
You may also want to watch:
He added: “Try as they might, they simply can’t find a way to get the boom of the cherry picker round, over or under the wire.
“It [was] not until 10.55 that they finally extract the patient through the window.”
Most Read
- 1 'The euphoria felt like the Summer of Love' – Kaleidoscope at Ally Pally
- 2 North London floods return – with South End Green deluged again
- 3 'Like the Fleet's resurfaced': Flash flooding hits Hampstead and Highgate
- 4 'Wartime spirit' as residents save shops from flash floods
- 5 Callum Chambers could be Arsenal's starting right-back
- 6 Teenager's artwork reimagines grandfather's class photo
- 7 Letters: The floods!
- 8 Haringey Council launches investigation into land deal with rapper
- 9 Arsenal signing Simone Boye Sorensen says she needed a 'new start'
- 10 5 great places in north London to get away from the summer crowds
A spokesman for London Fire Brigade said the service was called at 10.05am to assist the London Ambulance Service.
An aerial platform was deployed alongside one fire engine and one rescue unit.
They succeeded in bringing the patient down and had left the scene by 11am.
A spokeswoman for the London Ambulance Service said it sent two ambulances and a single responder car after receiving a call at 9.22am.
She added: “We treated a patient at the scene and took them as a priority to hospital.”
