Swindon Town announced Wiltshire Air Ambulance as their Charity of the Year for Season 2011/12 last week.
Below is an account from WAA Paramedic Richard Miller of an incident that occured after Town's 3-0 win over Leeds United in January 2010.
By Richard Miller
Whilst working my tour of nights on the Wiltshire Air Ambulance alongside Police Officer Charlie Spedding and Pilot Bob Lowis, our aircraft had been tasked by the police control room to monitor crowd control after the Leeds United fixture at The County Ground.
We took off from our base in Devizes at about 21:15 and within 15 minutes we were overhead, flying at about 1500ft monitoring small groups of supporters leaving the ground early after the Robins had won 3-0.
The County Ground can easily hold up to 14,000 spectators, so you can imagine that once the final whistle was blown our jobs, along with the other emergency services, were going to intensify greatly.
Sure enough, after the final whistle was blown, large volumes of supporters started to leave the ground and very quickly the roads became very congested, making it extremely difficult for vehicles to drive up and down County Road and into surrounding areas.
We hadn't been monitoring the crowd for long when we were notified by Ambulance Control of a male believed to have had a heart attack and had stopped breathing.
The location given by Control was a small car park next to the ground. Control informed us that medical staff from the club were making their way to him to offer assistance.
We evaluated a landing site and landed with a few minutes of the call on a stretch of waste ground next to the Stadium. I stepped out of the aircraft and was passed my grab bag by Charlie. This bag contains all of the resuscitation aids I'm likely to need in the early stages of a patient cardiac arrest.
I made my way the short distance to the patient along with Charlie who was carrying the defibrillator and drugs bag.
The patient was being resuscitated by a passerby and the club medical staff which consisted of a paramedic and doctor already on scene. I was informed by witnesses that they were behind the patient when he collapsed. They instantly begun resuscitation and called for help.
We began to resuscitate the patient using advanced life support, which included defibrillation and the administration of cardiac drugs.
Due to the fact that the roads were grid locked we made the decision to fly him the short distance to hospital. We stabilised him and loaded him into the aircraft.
During the flight to the Great Western Hospital the patient's heart re-started. We then continued to monitor him for any further improvement. When we arrived at the hospital, we were met by the hospital porters who helped us carry the patient.
The patient had arrived at hospital minutes within 15 minutes of the initial call being received by Ambulance Control; this may have been up to 40 minutes by road ambulance due to traffic conditions.
This proves exactly what the service provides to the general public, and hopefully this year's fundraising with Swindon Town can help keep it running.
If you have had any encounters with the WAA or would like to get involved in the fundraising effort in any way, please email marie@swindontownfc.co.uk.
You can also follow the team on Twitter by searching for @WiltsAirAmbu.
