401 people rescued by Shropshire fire service in a year

The rescues were from fires, car crashes and other callouts including people getting trapped in lifts and locked inside cars.

A Freedom of Information request revealed that between April 1 last year and March 31 this year there were 401 rescues made in total, with the majority being from calls not related to fires.

Fire crews rescued 331 people from non-fire incidents, all of whom had sustained some sort of injury.

They also rescued 70 people from fires, with only one escaping any harm.

Kevin Faulkner, Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service's group manager, said: "Our response starts from the moment we receive a call. Our call centre staff are highly trained in helping people to stay safe through giving early advice, helping the caller to keep calm and help themselves.

"Our firefighters not only rescue people from fires but are also highly skilled in rescuing people from all sorts of situations, including flooding, car crashes, water rescues and rescues from height.

"All of this contributes to making Shropshire a safer place to live and work."

Crews have been asked to rescue more than a dozen people from various situations this month alone.

In Telford a child was rescued after getting trapped inside a bathroom, while another child had to be released after being locked inside a car in Newport.

It isn't only children that get themselves stuck – a man had to be helped down from the roof of a building in Much Wenlock, and someone had to be rescued after getting themselves trapped in a gate in Donnington.

The service's water rescue team based at Shrewsbury has been busy as well, getting called out to a woman who had gone into the River Severn after her dog, and helping the police to pull her safely to shore.

But the majority of rescues attended were to help the victims of car crashes across the county.

In many of these cases the fire services works alongside ambulance personnel to give access to the casualties so that they can be treated.